Florida’s head of bond finance said lawmakers will likely re-establish the embattled Walt Disney Co.’s special district after the state passed a law that would dissolve the governing body next year.
Ben Watkins, director of the state’s division of bond finance, said legislators are likely to create a successor district, one that will assume many of the powers that Reedy Creek Improvement District, the agency that allows Disney to preform certain municipal functions at its resort properties like emergency services, garbage collection and infrastructure funding, currently has. The new district won’t have some of the powers previously granted that were never used such as operating a nuclear power plant.
“I’m confident that Reedy Creek will get addressed in a more meaningful way,” he said Thursday. Lawmakers will likely restore a limited version of the special district in the next legislative session, Watkins said. He added that Governor Ron DeSantis’s office has been “supportive” of the successor district approach, though lawmakers ultimately have the final say in how legislation will be drafted.
Bloomberg Politics
By Danielle Moran
July 22, 2022