The City of Anaheim’s Council has voted against Disney and other supporters of maintaining the Anaheim Resort District zoning, siding with a housing developer. The Los Angeles Times coverage is here, and the Orange County Register‘s coverage is here, with reader comments (some may be rude) below the article.
From the Times:
About 150 resort workers, many from Disney, attended the meeting in support of the development, some wearing stickers that read "Yes in Mickey’s Back Yard" (YIMBY). The dozen employees remaining at the meeting cheered when the project was approved.
The cheering was because many of these people think they will have access to the "affordable" (subsidized) housing that will be part of the project, while there is no guarantee that any of them will.
Disney officials said the thousands of people who would be living in the proposed units would be out of place in a district designed for tax-generating, visitor-friendly uses. Tourist officials say the resort area makes up less than 5% of the city’s land but generates nearly 50% of the city’s general fund. Disney wants the parcel to be developed as an upscale hotel-condominium project.
From the Register:
The zoning change is expected to pave the way for a SunCal proposal to build 1,500 homes, including 225 affordable apartments, on a 26.7-acre plot across from Disney property that may become a third theme park.
About 400 people showed up. A half hour before the meeting started, firefighters blocked the 156-capacity council chambers because it was already packed. Others stood in the lobby or sat on about 50 extra chairs where they watched the meeting on monitors.
Cast Members didn’t appear to be afraid of publicly going against their employer.
"We have enough entertainment in the city of Anaheim," said Anaheim resident Mike Wilson, 34, a bell hop at Disney’s Grand Californian. "We need our houses."