LOS ANGELES – A pair of Walt Disney Co. employees who sold their Southern California homes and relocated across the country when the company announced it was moving many jobs to a planned new campus in Florida are suing the entertainment giant.
In a proposed class-action lawsuit submitted Tuesday in Los Angeles Superior Court, Maria De La Cruz and George Fong contend they were told in 2021 that their jobs with Disney in Glendale were being moved from California to Florida, and they both sold their homes locally and bought new homes in the Sunshine State.
Disney announced in 2021 that it planned to relocate the workers to a new $1 billion office complex near Orlando, but later scrapped those plans, leaving employees like De La Cruz and Fong in a state of uncertainty.
The lawsuit alleges solicitation of employee by misrepresentation, intentional misrepresentation, concealment, and negligent misrepresentation. It seeks unspecified compensatory and punitive damages for the affected individuals.
The employees had to deal with fluctuating housing markets, financial losses, and the stress of uprooting their lives due to Disney’s decision reversal. George Fong, for example, had to navigate selling his Florida home and purchasing a new one with significantly less space in his native California.
As the legal battle unfolds, the case sheds light on the complexities of employment agreements and the repercussions of sudden corporate policy shifts on individual lives. It serves as a cautionary tale for employees who may face similar situations in the future.
