{"id":33002,"date":"2023-06-21T13:31:56","date_gmt":"2023-06-21T17:31:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/?p=33002"},"modified":"2023-06-21T13:32:06","modified_gmt":"2023-06-21T17:32:06","slug":"we-just-shot-ourselves-in-the-foot-disney-firefighter-union-leader-speaks-out-as-contract-is-stalled","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/2023\/06\/21\/we-just-shot-ourselves-in-the-foot-disney-firefighter-union-leader-speaks-out-as-contract-is-stalled\/","title":{"rendered":"\u201cWe Just Shot Ourselves in the Foot\u201d \u2014 Disney Firefighter Union Leader Speaks Out as Contract Is Stalled"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Disney World\u2019s Reedy Creek Improvement District (now called the Central Florida Tourism Oversight District) continues to be hit by massive changes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Over the past few months,\u00a0a new Board of Supervisors appointed by Florida Governor Ron DeSantis\u00a0has taken over and\u00a0lawsuits regarding the District have been filed by Disney<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0against Disney<\/a>. Now, we\u2019ve got another update, and\u00a0this time it\u2019s about the District\u2019s firefighters.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Reedy Creek has its own fire department \u2014 the department has been seen responding to incidents inside the Disney World theme parks before. When the plans were announced for the dissolution of the Reedy Creek District back in January 2023, it was revealed that the Reedy Creek firefighters backed this plan. Tim Stromsnes, the communications director of the Reedy Creek Professional Firefighters Local 2217, said, \u201cAnything has got to be better than what we currently have.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The firefighters were among the few who publicly welcomed the new Board, but now\u00a0there has been a change regarding the contract for the firefighters.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n

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According to AP News<\/a>, Alexei Woltornist, a Board spokesperson, said negotiations with the union were continuing, but offered no explanation as to why they reopened. The contract that was approved by first responders and firefighters last month promised better staffing and pay raises.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Woltornist said, \u201cAdministrator [Glenton] Gilzean is actively working with the fire department to finalize a deal that offers a competitive compensation package and gives firefighters the resources they need to protect the public\u201d in a recent email.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

During a Central Florida Tourism Oversight District meeting last month, a vote on this contract was expected. However, it was never brought up in that meeting and it did not appear on the agenda that was released for the next scheduled meeting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

200 firefighters and first responders have approved this three-year contract proposal \u2014 it would increase annual starting pay for firefighters from $55,000 to $65,000 and up to three dozen firefighters and paramedics would be hired.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Jon Shirey, who leads the firefighters\u2019 union, has praised the new Board for visiting firefighters at their stations around Disney World property. Shirey said, \u201cAlmost overnight, a change occurred that we have never experienced \u2014 transparency, open dialogue, the ability to sit down and have our issues heard and felt listened to.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Jon Shirey, President of the Reedy Creek Firefighters Association\u00a0<\/strong><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Now, according to Florida Politics<\/a>, Shirey recently slammed his union members for sharing the proposed contract \u2014 he said this is pressuring the new District administrator not to sign since other public officials are complaining about the deal. \u201cWe just shot ourselves in the foot to the tune of millions of dollars that this agreement would have put into the pockets of our members,\u201d Shirey wrote to the firefighters.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Disney World\u2019s Reedy Creek Improvement District (now called the Central Florida Tourism Oversight District) continues to be hit by massive changes. Over the past few months,\u00a0a new Board of Supervisors appointed… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":33004,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"wpai_generated_summary":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"{title}\n\n{excerpt}\n\n{url}","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"dois","default_image_id":71799,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"_wpas_customize_per_network":false},"categories":[17],"tags":[5279],"class_list":["post-33002","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-regional-and-world-news","tag-we-just-shot-ourselves-in-the-foot-disney-firefighter-union-leader-speaks-out-as-contract-is-stalled"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33002","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33002"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33002\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/33004"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33002"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33002"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33002"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}