Disney vs. SunCal, Part 3

Image © OCRegister.com

As many people have already heard the referendum proposed by Disney, the Anaheim Chamber of Commerce, and Save Our Anaheim Resort (SOAR) has been approved to be put to the voters on June 3rd. This is the California state primary election and will cost the city $250,000. In an earlier post I was upset that Disney was wasting Anaheim's money on the referendum and after doing a lot of thinking I changed my mind.

Now when I look at the fact that the Anaheim City council could have reversed their previous decision, that went against the resort district, and ended this mess once and for all I am disgusted by their actions. Disney is not wasting the city's money. They are. The Disneyland Resort is going to continue to grow. Whether that means a third gate or just increased attendance at Disney's California Adventure, but sooner or later they will need hotels and there will be a perfect piece of property devoted to low-income housing and condos. How affordable would the housing be? Your guess is as good as mine since they won't release any of those numbers. Why can't SunCal find property elsewhere to develop? I believe that this was the whole purpose of the Platinum Triangle project.


On another interesting note...Anaheim City Councilwoman Lorri Galloway held a meeting to attempt to reach a compromise and then repeal her previous vote. Her request to Disney was to lead a fund-raising drive to contribute $25 million to low-income housing over the next five years (extortion). She also wanted Disney to negotiate with three developers to remove their properties from the Resort District so they could build housing (This is what Disney was trying to avoid). Her only request for SunCal was fewer homes on the property (more campaign contributions). All in all this sounds like a very good compromise. I can't see why Disney didn't jump all over the offer (Can anyone tell me how to express extreme sarcasm in writing?).

The Anaheim City council has the chance to right their wrongs and instead chose to drag out the process and keep bowing to SunCal who will be in and out of the city in the amount of time that it takes to complete the project. Why can't they show Disney, who has been and will be in Anaheim for the long haul, some loyalty? So this will be out of the news and the casual observers minds for the next several months but Disney and SOAR will be hard at work convincing the people of Anaheim that this will be in their best interest.