Originally Posted By Darkbeer The April 24th, 2007 Anaheim City Council meeting started at 5 PM, and lasted until past midnight. 27 speakers from each side of the issue spoke, and Lucille Kring decided to vote with Lorri Galloway and Bob Hernandez to allow the SunCal Companies to continue to approach the council in regards to building housing with a low-cost housing (15%) element. Mayor Curt Pringle and Harry S. Sidhu, P.E. voted to deny the changes. One main point brought up in the long night, SOAR (Save Our Anaheim Resort) which is mainly businesses in the Resort Area, including Disney, did get the 20,000 signatures needed for an city initative to force a vote on any zoning change. So the battle in regards to the zoning change is far from over.... More later.... (Yes, I was there for the entire council meeting)
Originally Posted By disneysnout Thanks for Update; people around the Park are always complaing about the Fireworks. Does Disney really think they can Win the people's Vote?
Originally Posted By Moon Waffle I swear, Anaheim has to be about the stupidest city on the planet. Do you know how many cities there are in this country that would LOVE to have Disney set up shop in their neck of the woods?! They'd bend over backward for Disney - do whatever would please them to keep them happy and growing and generating jobs and revenue and business and tourism for their communities. And yet you have Anaheim doing something like this. The City of Anaheim needs to take a good look at what they would be without Disney. A dark part of me would love for Disney to someday completely pull out of Anaheim and move to another city (though of course this is ridiculous). Sorry I'm a bit passionate on this issue, but it frustrates me to no end!!!
Originally Posted By disneysnout I am with you Moonwaffle, i mean a thrid park, more Hotels, more money...the city rather have low income housing....
Originally Posted By Hans Reinhardt It's not all low income housing. In fact, only a very small percentage of one proposal is designated as "low income". I really don't see how Disney is going to convince the voters to stop the zoning changes without being scrutinized in the process. The company has a reputation for being arrogant in these kinds of dealings (recall the Long Beach/Anaheim 2nd theme park bid). Anaheim's citizens aren't likely to be very trustful of the corporate motives of one of the world's largest entertainment companies.
Originally Posted By fkurucz Yeah, too much infrastructure invested to just walk away. Still, I wonder what they will do when the big one hits, especially if it causes major (expensive) damage to DLR? Would they spend the millions (if not billions) to repair it? Or would they start over somewhere else? Nearby, or would they start over out of state/ Maybe in NV or AZ?. Maybe all those Texas rumors could become more than rumors. By staying local they can continue to access the huge built in SoCal market (assuming it isn't all rubble). If they are forced to leave, would they build a WDW west, or just another regional park (say DFW)?
Originally Posted By disneysnout WDW west....sounds good to me....This really Blows....it really Does...and it pisses me off
Originally Posted By GoofBall I sure do not understand the thinking of those voting for this. Does anyone think a letter campaign would do any good? I'm from out of town, well actually, out of state - I dont know that they would care about my opinion. But if it matters, we come once or twice a year and invest ALOT of $$$ around the resort. Why wouldnt they want to expand on this? Before DCA & DTD, we would come for 2 days and branch out to LA or San Diego for the rest of our vacation. Now its pretty much 5 or 6 days just in Anaheim. I think they were on the right track with making it a resort, but now.....?
Originally Posted By Darkbeer A letter campaign won't make a difference, this is really a Union vs Business issue, with politics the major part.... FYI, the City of Anaheim has plans to build an additional 1,328 Affordable Housing units in the next 4 years that is not related the Mobile Home park. <a href="http://www.anaheim.net/departmentfolders/planning/RFP/AffordableHousingStrategicPlan.pdf" target="_blank">http://www.anaheim.net/departm entfolders/planning/RFP/AffordableHousingStrategicPlan.pdf</a> I am for building affordable housing, but I don't think the Mobile Home Park property is the right location. It would also have the highest density of any area of Anaheim by far. Disney now has two options, and more than likely will use both of them. One is filing legal action on the re-hearing and the environmental planning. The second is submitting the 20,000+ signature for a referendum, and that should happen in the next couple of weeks. From the Orange County Register. <a href="http://www.ocregister.com/ocregister/news/local/anaheim/article_1668443.php" target="_blank">http://www.ocregister.com/ocre gister/news/local/anaheim/article_1668443.php</a> >>Disney and other business officials vowed to keep fighting. Todd Ament, Anaheim Chamber of Commerce president, announced that the coalition has gathered the 20,000 signatures needed to put the item on the ballot. Coalition members are expected to file signatures within two weeks.<< Should be interesting to follow this story... Just no more 7 hour council meetings......
Originally Posted By mrichmondj City councils are usually beholden to real estate development interestes. That's why you see so much uncontrolled suburban sprawl and total lack of city planning across the United States. Councils rarely pass up the chance to make a quick buck and let a developer barf up the latest strip mall, condo complex, or cul-de-sac laden community. Disney really doesn't stand a chance in this fight. The developers always win.
Originally Posted By Phantom This was a business vs. business fight - housing developer vs. tourism, and those Resort workers who showed up to fight for the housing developer are fools. Do they really think that any of them will actually get one of those units? Yeah, Disney pays low wages relative to the area's cost of living, compared to what Disney used to pay vs. the area's cost of living. But they APPLIED for those jobs. It wasn't like Disney rounded them up off of a street corner with a gun and said "HA HA! NOW YOU MUST WORK FOR US!" More housing means a need for more schools and other costly public services. Disney and other Anaheim Resort defenders want more tourism-focused businesses. More tourists will not require more schools to be build. But they will drop a lot of money and then leave the area. Isn't that good for Anaheim? This was bad vote. I hope Disney doesn't hold back from investing more in Anaheim as a result. The company has many, many options now for expanding its businesses elsewhere. Oh - and who wants to bet that whoever moves into this housing, if it is built, will then turn around and try to dictate what Disney can't and can't do, because they will complain about the traffic, noise, etc., just like all of those residents in the early 1990s did?
Originally Posted By spacejockey >>Councilwoman Lorri Galloway voted for the zoning change. "Two hundred families will be able to have something that they wouldn't otherwise have. To have a quality of life and decent housing for someone ... that means everything to me," she said.>> This lady either sounds like a real idiot or motivated by special interest. Once the developers remove the RV park and build these proposed units there will be less affordable housing. Especially, as someone mentioned, there is a ton of development in the platinum triangle were development could incorporate low income housing. Galloway's sob story is hardly believable, if she really cared that much about affordable housing you think she would have push it in other areas of development in Anaheim. This decision was obviously not about housing. Something smells fishy...
Originally Posted By bean This is all of Galloways moron mentallity. Why not build low income housing right next door to the resort within the platinum triangle. There is obviously plenty of large plots of land in that area that could be developed for housing and the area would need no rezoning.
Originally Posted By bean I agree with the person that mentioned about the workers that showed up to the meeting in favor of the housing. Do they actually think that 200 houses will make a diference and that they will be able to get one. There are already people that will line up to try to get one and then fill up one house with a few families. Low income sure the average price of one of those homes will be in the high 600,000. With the way the housing market is now and interest rates rising that is not one cheap monthly payment for most people. You will have multi families living inside one unit with multiple cars parked in the streets creating traffic problems and eventually a blight ridden area within a resort district.
Originally Posted By Hans Reinhardt "What about Garden Grove? Aren't they looking for a theme park?" Um, yeah. LOL.
Originally Posted By Hans Reinhardt "The developers always win." But isn't Disney a developer? In some regards Disney has to take the blame for this. Obviously economic conditions come into play, but had Disney been more agressive with its development plans Anaheim wouldn't be open to the possibilities of potential tax revenues from residential projects. Since about 2003 I've wondered why Disney hasn't made a commitment for a major hotel or DTD expansion at DLR. At the very least one would think that the company would be moving forward on some sort of hotel expansion by now.
Originally Posted By Phantom Hans, you are right. If Disney had built a better, more attractive second gate, they would have more pull with Anaheim right now. I can't help but thing some of the people in Anaheim feel like disney pulled a "bait-and-switch" when you compare the earlier Disneyland Resort plans, which were used to get the Anaheim Resort zoning and projects, with what was ultimately built. I still think the City Council's vote was wrong.
Originally Posted By disneysnout I Hope Disney does whatever it needs to do too win this...I hope they take all the options they have and fight untill the bitter end
