Morale and trust within the Walt Disney World government has deteriorated since allies of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis took it over earlier this year, according to many employees who have departed in recent months saying the governing district has been politicized and cronyism now permeates the organization.
More than 40 out of about 370 employees have left the Central Florida Tourism Oversight District since it was taken over in February, raising concerns that decades of institutional knowledge is departing with them, along with a reputation for a well-run government.
“When I first joined the District, I found an organization that strived to be the very best at serving our community, sought the very best employees and valued those employees above all else,” a former facilities manager with three years of experience said in an employee exit survey last week. “I find myself leaving a completely different District. A District that prioritizes politics above all else and will gladly sacrifice its employees, its community and its work if there’s an opportunity to score political points.”
Have you ever been to Disney World? I’ve been there quite a few times. Packing up and leaving wouldn’t be easy at all.
First of all, Disney World is huge. It’s 43 square miles or over 27,500 acres. Disney would need to find an equivalent sized area in a state that wouldn’t threaten to turn “MAGA Red” and that would have decent weather year round (i.e. no massive snow storms). It would also need to have a major airport nearby.
Next, Disney would need to rebuild all the infrastructure: roads, bridges, drainage systems, etc. They would need to rebuild all of the parks which would be a monumental effort itself. There are tunnels in Magic Kingdom that are used for employees. These would need to be rebuilt. Restaurants, hotels, and shops would need to be built. Employees would need to be relocated (or new employees hired). Animals would need to be transported from Animal Kingdom to the new park.
And while all this was going on, Disney World would need to keep operating. Building a New Disney World could easily take a decade even if everything went smoothly. Disney couldn’t afford to just shut down Disney World for 10 years.
It would cost Disney a lot less money to just beef up their already impressive legal team and donate to politicians likely to take a friendlier stance towards Disney. Disney could likely fund every Democratic politician in Florida from dog catcher to governor and still spend less than if they rebuilt Disney World.
(This isn’t to say that I’m a fan of companies buying favorable politicians. Just that it makes more financial sense for Disney to do this rather than rebuild.)
what if they tried to pack it up in a really big truck though
You’d need at least two trucks. Trust me. I’m an ingineer.
Acurate assessment. As much as I would like to see Disney scorched earth Florida, its not happening in the near future.
The other medium-term solution I could see is to begin winding down operations in Florida and redirecting resources to beefing up the other existing parks. Basically cut back all spending in Florida until the park park is barely breaking even. Let it sputter out slowly while expanding other properties.
That said, you’re probably right that The Mouse really needs to drop some cash in Florida and drastically alter the political landscape.
Fun fact: it’s not that they dug tunnels (the water table in Florida is too high for that); it’s that they raised the ground elevation of the entire park to above the top of corridors created at the original ground level.