The Dollars and Sense of Protecting the Pitons

SAINT Lucians are, once again, starting to rile-up against what many at home and abroad, as well as environmental advocates and activists see as Big Money foreigners flashing their cash in pursuit of Paradise 2.0 — and once more, it involves The Pitons.

Those with long memory spans will remember four decades ago when local environmental consciousness got a quick boost from agitation around prevention of super-rich relatives of the late Shah of Iran from building an aerial tramway across the summits of both Gros and Petit Pitons.

More recently, there have been mobilizations against a proposed ‘Dolphin Park’ at Pigeon Island; and before the 2021 General Elections there were protests against construction of the Cabot golf course at Cap Estate by a Canadian company, to protect Amerindian burial sites and pressure for removal or relocation of the beachside property of a blind former beach vendor the developers claimed was in their project’s way.

The protesting has returned to The Pitons and it’s all to do with a dirty-rich Canadian’s plans to construct what he says is an extension to his current home, but which critics claim may be the beginning of a plan for an ultimate super-rich private resort—and thus threaten UNESCO’s designation of the twin peaks described by Derek Walcott as ‘Helen’s Breasts’ as a heritage site worthy of international protection.

Canada’s ‘Globe and Mail’ newspaper last week minimized the issue to being one about “a vacation home owned by a senior executive at Dollarama Inc. and his plans to add another dwelling to the property…” in reference to the man at the center of the current controversy, Geoffrey Robillard.

Globe and Mail revealed, that “trading records” show that “in the nearly 14 years since the initial public offering, Robillard has netted Cdn. $126-million, pretax, on sales of Dollarama stock” and “in the last fiscal year, he earned a base salary of $1.5-million, plus a $500,000 bonus…”

But Robillard, represented by one of the island’s best law firms, won a recent court decision that reprimanded the government for failing to turn Cabinet ‘guidelines’ into legally-backed ‘regulations.’

Robillard claimed the government is delaying permission for him to add an extended piece to his 6,500 square-foot house and argued it was a violation of his constitutional right to enjoy his property.

But some of his critics also claim Robillard might have bought Saint Lucian citizenship through the island’s Citizenship by Investment scheme — and with it all the constitutional rights guaranteed citizens.

Historically, investors in tourism have always been showered with umbrella tax-free incentives and other long-term arrangements, but today there’s much attention paid to investors whose developments threaten the local environment or – as also in this case – possibly limit local access to public beaches.

It’s also an age when environmental consciousness has come more to the front of people’s minds thanks to accelerated climate change – and when more attention is being paid to cases like this where money talks — and makes mares fly.

This situation has also revealed many discomforts about successive governments’ overall positions, reflecting different strokes for different investors, including decisions of a ‘one-man’ Development Control Authority (DCA), declaration of the area concerned as a Special Development Are — and lack of coordination between involved local agencies and departments.

Meanwhile, as more people get more agitated and facts remain blurred, time is running-out ahead of an upcoming UNESCO meeting where the latest developments in and affecting the Pitons Management Area (PMA) will be examined, with obvious implications for the future continued recognition of the site as worthy of protection.

Earlier this week, with the announcement that President Joe Biden had added to protection of indigenous heritage sites in the Arizona section of the Grand Canyon national park, I reached out to Dr James ‘Jimmy’ Fletcher, who worked tirelessly to secure the World Heritage Site status still being pursued with UNESCO.

He says he expects the ordeal “will raise red flags” for UNESCO.

According to Dr Fletcher, “There are so many other places that you could build. But there are a few places that we should keep sacrosanct.”

He said “no private developer” could simply decide to build at Stonehenge, Machu Picchu or in Yellowstone National Park “just because they can…” and the former Cabinet minister surmised that “If we don’t allow someone to put up a family home adjacent to the Taj Mahal, why should we allow someone to do the same to the Pitons?”

Dr. Fletcher advises the government to “enshrine the guidelines into law and consider using new sustainable-financing mechanisms to purchase land from private owners.”

He also thinks the developer should play a role in protecting the site as well, suggesting, “It’s incumbent on them to return to the government of Saint Lucia and say, ‘Okay, you know what? How can we correct this? We don’t want to be seen as unwelcome visitors.”

Truth be told, nothing in the narrative so far suggests the Dollarama man will take Dr Fletcher’s advice.

This matter will eventually be settled – one way or the other, in or out of court — as none of the parties involved will want to be seen as backing down.

But, as with the creation of the Saint Lucia Environment and Development Action Committee (SLEDAC) around the Pitons aerial tramway project back in the 1980s, the subsequent Jalousie Hotel brouhaha, the more recent bitter issue of access to Sugar Beach and now the Dollarama Dollars-and-Sense matter — all provided opportunities to broaden the discussion to include wider popular education.

People are still largely unaware of many other as-important issues like the history of the area, its role in earlier anti-colonial struggles, its abundance of archeological treasures, its use as a base for telling time accurately through astronomy in pre-Columban times — and why it’s home to both the ‘Valley of the Free’ (Fond Gens Libre) and the Bay of Drunkards (Anse L’ivroigne).