Here we go. The Central Florida Tourism Oversight District board has decided to clean the AHJ of all Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion policies regarding contracting.
The Reedy Creek website was updated with an article titled CFTOD Abolishes DEI Board and Race-based Contracting. The district’s new administrator, Gelton Gilzean, claims that the DEI programs were illegal:
“The so-called diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives were advanced during the tenure of the previous board and they were illegal and simply unamerican. Our district will no longer participate in any attempt to divide us by race or advance the notion that we are not created equal. As the former head of the Central Florida Urban League, a civil rights organization, I can say definitively that our community thrives only when we work together despite our differences.”
In the press release issued by the CFTOD, it mentioned that Reedy Creek’s Minority/Women Business Enterprise and Disadvantaged Business Enterprise programs’ quotas were being heavily scrutinized to make sure certain race and gender checkboxes were being upheld:
“… the Reedy Creek Improvement District routinely awarded contracts based on racially and gender driven goals to businesses on the basis of their owners’ race and gender. Through the program, the Reedy Creek Improvement District instituted gender and racial quotas to ensure that contractors met a certain threshold of diversity.
The statement continues, focusing on how race and gender quotas were constantly audited to ensure compliance. This level of supervision also cost the district a chunk of change:
“In order to meet these quotas, it is estimated that the district had to pay millions of dollars more in order to find businesses who could comply. After entering into a contract, Reedy Creek employees aggressively monitored contractor’s racial and gender practices, wasting taxpayer dollars. Previous contracts threatened contractors who did not keep up with racial or gender quotes with nonpayment and disqualification from future bidding.”
This comes just a week after Central Florida Tourism Oversight District member Martin Garcia called the former board’s actions “naughty.”
[Source: Reedy Creek Improvement District Website]
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