Disney Reaffirms Its Support of Anaheim Resort : Amusement parks: But a corporate executive warns that a final decision on the $3-billion project is months away.

Amid reports that the company is wavering on its commitment to the proposed Disneyland Resort, Walt Disney Co. officials Thursday assured a group of supporters that they will continue to push ahead on the project and urged them to turn out for all public hearings on the resort in the months ahead.

“We are trying to make this happen for the community,” said Ronald K. Dominguez, executive vice president of Walt Disney Attractions. “We’re taking a very active role. . . . (But) it’s still on the edge.”

Speaking to about 100 supporters of a group called Westcot 2000 formed to rally behind the project and lobby city officials, Dominguez indicated that Disney and the city have reached tentative agreement “on most” of the project’s development issues.

Despite the progress, Dominguez told the supporters gathered at the Holiday Inn in Anaheim that a final decision on whether to build the ambitious $3-billion resort is still months away.

He noted that after negotiators reach a development agreement, the document will have to be reviewed at public hearings before the city’s Planning Commission and City Council.

“We’re going to need your help,” said Dominguez, who encouraged the Westcot members to speak in support of the project at the public hearings. Those hearings should begin by spring, he said.

“I believe we are going to have a very busy spring,” added Doug Moreland, director of development for the Disney Development Co.

The hearings give the project’s opponents “one more bite at the apple,” as well as another opportunity to file lawsuits challenging the development agreement, Moreland added.

Even when the development agreement with Anaheim is completed, Disney officials said they will continue to seek state and federal assistance before they will build the project. So far, the state has committed $60 million in transportation funds to the project and the federal government has chipped in at least $15.5 million for a multiuse parking structure.

Disney officials also assured supporters that no part of the project is being scaled back. As planned, the project will include 5,000 hotel rooms, a 5,000-seat amphitheater, a shopping and garden district ringing a six-acre lake and a new theme park next to Disneyland called Westcot.

The project also calls for massive public roadway, sewage and utility improvements and two of the nation’s largest parking structures.

Recently, there have been signs that Disney may have lost enthusiasm for investing in the project, especially in light of the company’s financial debacle at Euro Disney near Paris.

Over the last several months, Disney’s Westcot project director has resigned, Westcot staff has been redeployed to other projects and Disney Chairman Michael Eisner gave his gloomiest assessment of the project’s financial feasibility.