ORANGE COUNTY, Fla. – Union workers employed by Disney World and nearby hotels hosted a drive-through food pantry in Orange County, feeding 500 fellow furloughed employees.
After reopening Disney Springs, leaders recently announced plans for Disney’s Animal Kingdom and Magic Kingdom to reopen on July 11, with Epcot and Hollywood Studios reopening on July 15.
Jannette Weiss participated in distributing food. She has worked at Disney for 32 years, most recently as a server in Cinderella's Castle.
“It’s exciting I can’t wait to go back and make magic,” she said. “I miss my work family. One thing COVID-19 taught everybody is (that) community is important. We all need to stick together, you’re not all alone. We’re all here together.”
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Jeremy Haicken is the President of UNITE HERE Local 737, which represents employees with food, beverage and housekeeping at Disney World, as well as workers at nearby hotels.
Haicken told News 6 the union recently conducted a survey among its members, asking if employees had received unemployment benefits.
Nearly a third of 3,500 respondents told the union responded that they have not received unemployment benefits from the state.
"I think people are excited to go back to work but they want to be safe and they’re also suffering because of the broken unemployment system," Haicken said. "
"Even if you’re going back to work three or four weeks from now, you can’t wait three or four weeks to eat if you don’t have unemployment."
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June Finch waited in line for quite a while to get her food. Before the pandemic, she worked as a part-time employee at the Grand Floridian.
“These guys are incredible,” she said. “I’m part-time so I probably won’t go back for a long time, but it’s a start.”
Despite reopening the park soon, the union plans to continue weekly drive-through food pantries.