Malcon10t
DIS Veteran
- Joined
- Feb 21, 2006
You keep repeating this. Do you understand how the bond for this project worked? I know the soon to be former mayor keeps wording it like this. But have you delved deeper into how it actually works? If it was truly as you said, the excess $105 million could be used to help their massive unfunded pension plan, because Disney would have no say in how it was done.No more hand outs like the Mickey and Friends parking deck which was the biggest example of corporate welfare I've ever seen. Disney has probably made billions of dollars and kept every penny of it and has never repaid the city for the construction of that parking deck that the city paid for and sold to Disney for 1 DOLLAR.
In 1996, Anaheim wanted to clean up Anaheim. They wanted to make Anaheim more attractive to travelers. Disneyland was going to build DCA. It was going to need more parking since they were taking out the parking lot to build DCA. They were also going to put in DTD. Disney and Anaheim struck a bargain. Anaheim would include a parking structure and the "flyover" lanes to the parking structure (about $95 million) in the $400 million in bonds to clean up around Anaheim, widen streets, remove the flashing signs, replaced with monument style signs, move electrical and telephone lines underground, improve the area around the convention center, improve the area around the Amtrak station/the then Edison Field, etc.. Disney would agree to use its AAA corporate bond rating to cover the bonds, giving Anaheim a lower interest rate on the bonds, Disney would guarantee the bonds (if Anaheim could not cover the $400 million, Disney would pay them off) and to create the extra income to pay these bonds, the hotel occupancy tax would increase 3%. (It used to be about 14%, jumped to 17%) Just on Disney resort hotels, this would create an extra $4.8 million per year the first few years. (Closer to $9 million a year now.) When the bonds are paid off, Anaheim is to sell the building back to Disney for $1. And revert the occupancy tax. Because Disney backed and guaranteed the bonds, they are able to say "If the 3% occupancy tax for a given year, the excess must be put in escrow for future payments and cannot be moved to the general fund." This is what irks the mayor most. They feel they should be able to take this tax money that was earmarked for a specific project, and move it to where they have screwed up.
And it hasn't been sold to Disney yet. Disney is still on the hook for the bonds for another 16/17 years. So, *I* don't view it as a hand out. Anaheim got what they wanted, backed by Disney. The taxes collected for the project are not coming out of the pocket of the people who live in Anaheim, it is being paid for the tourists who pay the occupancy taxes.
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