DeSantis ally gains power to close Disney attractions and issue fines of $500 a day for code violations

A longstanding ally of Florida Governor Ron DeSantis has been named trustee of the newly created precinct that includes Disney World, and has been given extensive powers to wreak havoc on the theme park.

Glen Gilzean’s nomination was approved Wednesday by the board of the Central Florida Tourism Oversight District. The district was created in February to replace the Reedy Creek Improvement District—a self-governing zone created in 1967 but dismantled during DeSantis’ attack on Disney’s “wake up” policy.

Gilzean will represent the state of Florida in their legal battle with Disney.

Disney has strongly objected to DeSantis’ attempts to exert control over the company.

On Wednesday, Disney CEO Bob Iger told shareholders in a phone call that DeSantis was threatening $17 billion in investment and putting 13,000 jobs at risk.

Gilzean was given the authority to close theme park attractions – including the Magic Kingdom and Epcot – and fine Disney $500 a day for unspecified “code violations.”

Gilzean will hire enforcers who will answer to him.

Rick Foglesong, a Walt Disney World historian, narrated The Orlando Sentinel that Disney should be concerned about the newly created role.

‘You would think [Disney] would see a threat here,” he said.

Gilzean is well paid for his services and receives a salary of $400,000.

He is currently the president and CEO of the Central Florida Urban League – a social and economic justice group, which aims to “end generational poverty by empowering Central Florida to achieve social and economic equality through education, employment and entrepreneurship’.

He is also the chairman of Florida’s Commission on Ethics – a position he was appointed to by DeSantis.

In 2020, DeSantis gave him an additional role on the pandemic-era business promotion committee, the Re-Open Florida Task Force.

In April, Disney sued DeSantis over the additional taxes levied by the new district.

The entertainment giant has been at odds since speaking out against DeSantis’ “Don’t Say Gay” law, which bans mention of homosexuality of LGBTQ issues in front of young people in schools.

Disney said in their lawsuit: “A targeted campaign of government retaliation — orchestrated every step of the way by Governor DeSantis as punishment for Disney’s protected speech — now threatens Disney’s business operations, jeopardizes its economic future in the region and violates its constitutional rights. rights.’

Disney CEO Bob Iger said that on Wednesday fired the last shot escalating war between the $185 billion dollar amusement park company and the Republican governor, who is expected announce one presidential campaign in the coming months.

Iger, during a phone call with company shareholders on Wednesday, did not name DeSantis or say outright that Disney is reconsidering the investment.

But his warnings were clear in his tone and his words.

Iger said Florida is acting unfairly and asked shareholders, “Does the state want us to invest more, hire more people, and pay more taxes or not?”

He said he is “accurately evaluating where it makes sense to focus future investments” in Disney’s theme parks.

“We certainly never expected to be able to defend our business interests in federal court given our 50-year relationship with the state,” Iger said.

DeSantis has yet to immediately respond to Iger’s threats, but in the past has shown no hesitation in taking on the company, saying, “Disney has no right to corporate welfare.”

Neither Iger, the 72-year-old CEO of Disney, nor DeSantis, the 44-year-old Republican governor with presidential ambitions, show signs of backing down from their war.

Each side has instead tried to beat each other.

Disney sued Florida and the state filed a countersuit.

Both have issued threats, including DeSantis’s, including raising hotel taxes and tolls and building a prison on state-owned land near the Disney theme park.

The governor’s fight against Disney has raised his national profile ahead of speculation that he will announce a presidential bid this spring.

He has also made it part of his war on wake as he makes the culture wars a centerpiece of his strategy.

Disney’s CEO repeated his argument that his company faced retaliation in return for speaking out.

“There was no concrete attempt to dismantle Reedy Creek until we acted on legislation,” Iger said Wednesday.

“This is clearly a matter of retaliation.”

Before DeSantis’s allies took over Disney World’s board district, the old board — controlled by Disney supporters — reached an agreement with the company in February to ban a long list of companies from ever operating near the property.

Those included tattoo parlors, liquor stores, adult entertainment, oil refineries, and caravan parks.

But there were no prisons.

The agreement, which also gave Disney control over the design and construction of the theme park resort, is at the center of the dueling lawsuits.

It is also the target of a new law passed last week by Florida’s Republican-controlled legislature that seeks to overturn the deal.

Disney earned $7.4 billion from its parks for the most recent quarter of fiscal 2022 — up 70 percent from a year earlier when it was recovering from COVID shutdowns.

The theme park is now charging for some of its previously free features, including the Genie+ app ($15) and parking ($30). Even the price of his iconic Mickey Mouse ears has increased by more than a third since 2021, from $29.99 to $39.99.

The company was drawing an average of 18 million visitors a year to Disney World before the pandemic — a room at the park’s low-cost hotel, Pop Century, costs about $168 today — more than $70 from 2013, when a room at the resort would cost $95. That is an increase of more than 77 percent.

Ticket prices at the park — now over $100 — have increased at about double the rate of inflation in the 2010s.

Disney World is the largest employer in central Florida, with nearly 75,000 employees and 36.2 million visitors by 2021, according to the Themed Entertainment Association.

Wednesday’s earnings call wasn’t the first time Iger has used the platform to attack the governor.

During an April 3 phone call, he berated DeSantis for getting “very angry” about the company’s position and labeled his actions “anti-Florida.”

In its lawsuit, Disney used similar language.

“Governor DeSantis and his allies appear to have no intention of moderating their retaliatory campaign any time soon,” Disney noted in his additions to the lawsuit filed in a U.S. district court in Tallahassee.

DeSantis’ office said Disney’s lawsuit was “desperate.”

“Development agreements, as creations of state law, are clearly subject to revocation by subsequently enacted state law,” the governor’s communications director, Taryn Fenske, said in a statement.

Disney’s latest move is yet another desperate attempt to preserve their special privileges and ignore the will of the Floridians, as expressed by their duly elected representatives.

“Disney has to accept that it has to live under the same rules as everyone else,” she added.