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2007 Placencia News
Archives |
Definitely not all the news that's fit to
print - and definitely not on a daily basis. But, we'll try to update
frequently about things like road conditions and significant events
affecting the area - sometimes even gossip - maybe. Let us know if you
have anything to add. But, we retain full editorial discretion over
information on this page.
14 November
2007. Maya Island Resort
Properties, Ltd., a Belize corporation owned in part by Eugene Zabaneh, and
The Poe Companies, a US real estate development company based in Louisville,
have submitted an environmental impact assessment (EIA) to the Belize
Department of the Environment (DOE) asking for approval to build a resort on
False Caye, located approximately a 1/2 mile from the Placencia Peninsula
near Seine Bight and Maya Beach.
If approved, the development
will include 106 hotel rooms, 14 over-the-water 2-bedroom cabanas, 19
3-bedroom villas and 41 4-bedroom villas. At capacity, the resort
would house 950 people, including 75 employees. Resort amenities would
include 2 swimming pools, spa, helipad and manmade beach.
False Caye is on overwash
mangrove caye at -6" sea level. Five feet of dredged fill will be
necessary to build the resort and will require the destruction of most of
the mangrove and other habitat on the island.
The False Caye EIA is
available on-line at www.doe.gov.bz .
Site plan is available at
www.placenciadocuments.info/false_caye/false_caye_site_plan.pdf
Comments on the False Caye EIA by Peninsula Citizens for Sustainable
Development are available at
www.placenciadocuments.info/false_caye/false_caye_comments.pdf
7 November
2007
 Trouble in
Paradise. Village Council Chairman Brian Yearwood called an
"emergency" Village meeting on Saturday, 3 November 2007 to discuss
development plans for The Placencia Club, a mixed use development by a joint
venture between Diane Bulman, who developed Chabil Mar, and Reagan
International (Dennis Johnson). Melvin Hulse, UDP Candidate for Area
Representative, was also present at the meeting.
According to Yearwood and
Hulse, both title to the Placencia Club property (roughly behind Chabil Mar,
Turtle Inn and Placencia Building Supply in the Placencia Lagoon) and
development approval were illegally granted by the Belize government.
Yearwood also explained that much of the same land had been promised to
Placencia Village for years so that a subdivision could be built to provide
lots to Villagers who needed land to be able to continue living in the
Village. (We can confirm that the Village Council first announced that this
land would be available for lots as early as 2001, shortly after Hurricane
Iris.)
Yearwood and Hulse called for
public activism to persuade the Belize government to take back both title
and approval of the planned development.
 On
Monday, 5 November 2007, Villagers received an email from Chairman Yearwood
asking them to be at the Placencia Club property behind Chabil Mar Villas at
9:00 AM on 7 November 2007 when he would be interviewed about the
development by Channel 7.
About 30 people showed up,
but trouble quickly reared its head when several Villagers disputed
Yearwood's version of the "facts."
 Apparently,
some number of lots will be made available solely for purchase by Placencia
Village residents, at a cost of somewhere in the BZ$25,000 - BZ$35,000
range, which David Vernon stated was reasonable given the cost of dreding,
filling and providing infrastructure such as roads, drainage, water,
electricity and sewage disposal.
Vernon's assertion of the
reasonableness of the selling price for Village lots in the development gave
rise to further disputes among those attending the meeting, all disputes
duly recorded by Channel 7.
What is the real truth about
the development? The Peninsula Citizens for Sustainable Development (PCSD)
maintains that no one in the community really knows. An Environmental
Impact Assessment (EIA) was not required for the development, and the
Department of the Environment will not respond to inquiries regarding why an
EIA was not required. Nor will DOE release a copy of the Environmental
Compliance Plan signed by DOE and the developer. (According to PCSD,
they have been attempting to obtain the ECP for 2 weeks with no success.)
4 September
2007
 Hurricane
Felix: Except for the birds, Placencia is very quiet this
morning, many people having evacuated yesterday to weather Hurricane Felix
in less dangerous locales. About half of the homes and businesses along the
Sidewalk are boarded up and vacant. For most of the weekend it seemed
inevitable t hat
Placencia would take much of the brunt of Hurricane Felix as a Category
Five. Few people seemed to want to take any chances after the almost
complete destruction of Placencia and Seine Bight Villages by Hurricane Iris
in 2001 and the close call of Hurricane Dean just two weeks ago. Both
Tropic and Maya are closing after the first flight out this morning as part
of their emergency hurricane plans. However, we seem to have dodged
the Felix bullet. We may get some rain and possibly a surge, but that
seems to be about it if we feel any effects at all.
The same cannot be said for
Nicaragua and Honduras, and many people there will need our assistance and
support to recover from Felix, which is currently hitting the coast of
Nicaragua where some of its most vulnerable population lives - the Miskito
Indians. According to AP reports, the Nicaraguan government set up
shelters inland about 50 miles, but was unable to offer evacuation
assistance due to the terrain of that area of the country - mangrove swamp.
And, mudslides caused by rain from Felix could result in many deaths.
Aid agencies should be making donation information available as soon as
Felix has passed and they can get an idea of how much help is needed.
22 June 2007:
Resorts and
Hotels:
-
Rum
Point has been sold. Luke Espat now has an ownership interest
in the property (of what nature, we're not sure). Corol Bevier will
leave the country some time in the next six months. A 10-story hotel is
rumored to be planned for the site.
-
Mariposa Beach Suites has been sold. Marcia and Peter Fox are
now residing in Guatemala. Mariposa is now a private residence.
-
Maya
Breeze Inn has been sold and Buddy and Tressa have left the country.
Maya Breeze remains in operation.
Sewage System: Engineers without Borders have now completed the
initial feasibility study for the proposed Peninsula-wide sewage system.
The feasibility study can be downloaded from
http://www.southbelize.com/placencia_waste_water_project.htm
New
Developments:
-
False
Caye: Plans have been drawn up for the development of False
Caye, just off the coast of the northern part of the Peninsula. No
word yet from Department of Environment or Geology about when the plans will
be made public and when an EIA will be available. A mangrove caye,
False Caye hosts abundant fish life, including juvenile barracuda, lobster
and conch. It's also one of the best snorkeling spots that can be
reached by kayak from the Peninsula. Lisa Carne, a marine biologists
who lives on the Peninsula, took underwater photographs around False Caye on
16 May 2007. False
Caye Underwater Pictures.
-
Villas
at Coco Plum (north of Seine Bight): 25 condo buildings/100
condos, 64 2-bedroom condos/36 3-bedroom condos on 12 acres with 500 feet of
beachfront in 2-3 story buildings. Projected completion date:
April 2008.
-
Coco
Plum: A Resort Community (north of Seine Bight): 224 acares
including 12 acres for Villas at Coco Plum, 13 acres for a 48-suite boutique
resort, 56.5 acres for 110 single family homes (approx. 1/2 acre each), 4.2
kilometers of feeder roads, 10 acres open space/park, 200 foot pier, sports
facility, spa, parking area, marina and swimming pools.
-
Manatee
Bay Estates (between Coco Plum and Surfside Residential Community):
Phase I, 7 single family home lots, Phase II, 27 single family home lots.
-
Wild
Orchid Properties (Lagoon near Robert's Grove): 3 acres/16 lots/7
condo buildlings/5 condos per building, 35 condos total, 30 standard
2-bedroom/2-bath condos, 5 penthouse 3-bedroom/3-bath condos, marina, pool,
yacht club, restaurant, fitness center.
-
Sunset
Pointe (Placencia Village): 16 2-bedroom/2-bath condos in 4
buildings (1 completed, 2 almost completed, 1 under new construction).
-
Bella
Maya Resort and Residences (Plantation area): 60 condos, all
2-bedroom/2 bath, Lagoon-front restaurant and bar. Almost completed.
-
The
Placencia Hotel and Residences (Plantation area): 1 and 3
bedroom condos (completed?), 158 residential lots (dredging and filling
still underway).
-
Los
Portico Villas (site of old Kitty's/Sak's resort): 39
2-bedroom/2-bath condos, restaurant, convention facilities, spa, marina.
Demolition underway.
-
Villas
at Placencia (northern Seine Bight Village): 4-56 condos in 8
or 9 buildings. Clearing underway.
-
Kokomo
Belize (north of Seine Bight Village): 2 cabanas, 20
housing lots, marina. Sign on road shows map of area with mangrove
area on which is labeled "future development."
-
Site of
Luba Hati: rumored 245 room hotel.
-
Ara
Macao: Justice Awich refused to allow PCSD to proceed with its
action for judicial review of the approval of the development and PCSD did
not have funds to file an appeal of Awich's decision. No development
has yet begun to take place. 628 acres, 1 mile oceanfront, 200 feet
frontage on Placencia Lagoon, one 260 room 3-story hotel with 100,000 square
feet of common area, 296 villas in 74 2-story buildings, 458 condos in 38
4-story buildings, private 18-hole golf course, 55 acres for 59 private golf
course houses, golf clubhouse , 67 acre marina for up to 400 boats of up to
100 feet), dredged to a 12-foot depth, including fueling station, boat
storage and repair yard (38,000 square feet and harbor master building
(2,500 square feet), restaurant: 7,500 square feet, with capacity of 200
people, casino and night club of 106,250 square feet with a capacity of
1,000 people (local use to be discouraged), two reception and activities
centers (38,800 square feet and 25,000 square feet), two commercial centers
(320,000 square feet and 90,000 square feet), retail center with 5 retail
shops and exhibition center (retails shops will be 50,000 square feet), 50
employee housing units of 700 square feet each to house a total of 300
people (6 persons per unit), 4 maintenance and support facilities totaling
50,000 square feet
14 April 2007:
Village
Council Elections:
Ara
Macao: On 2 April 2007, the Peninsula Citizens for Sustainable
Development (PCSD) filed an action contesting approval of Ara Macao by the
Department of the Environment. First hearing date is set for 20 April
2007.
Illegal
Dredging/Sand Mining in Placencia Lagoon. As the result of
complaints by PCSD, police shut down an illegal sand mining/dredging
operation by the Albert Loewen construction company in the Placencia Lagoon
on Friday, 13 April 2007. A permit from the Department of Geology is
required to mine ANY sand from the Lagoon, including the dredging of boat
slips.
Resorts:
-
Saks at
Placencia. Saks at Placencia
(f/k/a Kitty's Place) is now closed and the old buildings are being
demolished or moved off the premises. New condos, Portico Villas, will
take their place.
-
Luba
Hati. Luba Hati has been sold (along with most all the
properties north of Robert's Grove) to a Scottish investment group.
Rumors are that the investment group plans to construct a 289 room hotel on
the assembled properties. Purportedly, kitchen equipment was already
being removed from Luba Hati on Tuesday, 11 April 2007 in preparation for
its demolition. No further information is available.
-
Serenity Resort. Serenity Resort has been sold to Richard
Hoare, and has been renamed Punta Mar.
-
The
Placencia. Graham Cabral is new manager of The Placencia,
located about 12 miles north of Placencia Village.
-
Rum
Point. Rumor is that the sale of Rum Point will close this
month.
The
Road. Surprise. Road work did not start in March 2007.
The legislature has approved the construction, and that approval has been
Gazetted, and bids are purportedly being taken.
3 February
2007
Resorts:
Ara Macao
Resort and Marina:
The Environmental Compliance Plan (ECP) was signed by the Government
of Belize and the Ara Macao developer on 3 January 2007, although the
Department of the Environment refused to release information on the status
of the ECP when questioned by a member of the National Environmental
Advisory Commitee (NEAC). PCSD has not yet been able to get a copy of the
final form of the ECP. As soon as a copy is available, it will be posted.
The Peninsula Citizens for
Sustainable Development (PCSD) will soon be filing an action for judicial
review of the approval process for Ara Macao Resort. An attorney has already
been engaged, and PCSD has locally raised almost BZ$12,000 locally.
An additional BZ$13,000 is
necessary to fully fund the litigation.
Donations are very much
needed, and can be made anonymously if desired.
Donations may be mailed to
Peninsula Citizens for Sustainable Development, General Delivery, Placencia,
Belize. (If making a donation by check and anonymity is required, please
include a note that you do not want your name released.)
Money may also be wire
transferred to PCSD, using the following wiring instructions:
Bank of New York
36-63 Main Street
New York, New York 11354
ABA#: 021000018
For credit to Atlantic Bank
Swift Code: IRVTUS3N
Atlantic Bank Account No: 8900545925
For further credit to
Peninsula Citizens for Sustainable Development, Atlantic Bank Account no.
100158838
Please note that if wiring
from the US, this is NOT an international wire. The funds are wired to Bank
of New York which, in turn, transfers them to PCSD in Placencia.
Information about the Ara
Macao development and the development approval process.
The Peninsula Citizens for
Sustainable Development is a registered community organization composed of
volunteers from the Peninsula area who are concerned with the rapid, and
often poorly planned and executed, development of the Peninsula. PCSD seeks
to bring information about proposed developments to the local residents to
ensure that all such developments are environmentally sustainable with
respect to the fragile eco-systems of the Peninsula and its communities and
cultures.
Soulshine: The Soulshine property has apparently been sold, and
condos will replace the old cabanas and other buildings. (The main building
at Soulshine was destroyed by fire in 2006.)
Villas
at Placencia: This condo development , located north of the old
Bahia Laguna property in Seine Bight, has now been approved without an EIA
being required, and with no public notice. The Website for the
development is located at
www.villasatplacencia.com.
Saks at
Placencia:
Saks at Placencia Beach Resort (formerly known as Kitty's Place) will close
during the first week of May 2007 so that the owners can tear down existing
structures, and put up, yes, condos.
The
Road: The Caribbean Development Bank and the Government of
Belize have announced that road work will start in March 2007.
According to earlier discussions with CDB, road construction will start at
the Placencia airstrip and work its way north. The road into Placencia
Village from the airstrip will not be part of the funded project.
Whale Sharks:
Some may remember that furor that erupted on the
Peninsula when it was discovered that Friends of Nature was considering
selling one or more whale sharks to the Georgia Aquarium. The Georgia
Aquarium eventually withdrew its offer to purchase the whale sharks, and
bought them instead from the Japanese. Well, it turns out that those
opposed to the sale were right
(see News
starting at 27 January 2004):
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/13/science/13shark.html
ATLANTA, Jan. 12 — To those
who questioned the propriety of keeping the giant whale shark in
captivity, the philanthropist Bernie Marcus liked to say that in his
aquarium here, the shark, the world’s largest fish, would also be the
world’s most pampered.
But a specialized diet of krill and fortified gelatin, a
6.2-million-gallon fish tank and state-of-the-art medical care were not
enough to save Ralph, one of the four graceful, dappled whale sharks that
were star attractions at the lavish $290 million Georgia Aquarium that
opened here to great fanfare just over a year ago.
Ralph, an adolescent whale shark 22 feet long, died
mysteriously on Thursday, reopening questions about whether whale sharks,
a species about which little is known, should ever be taken from the wild.
Jeffery S. Swanagan, the chief executive of the Georgia
Aquarium, said that none of the four whale sharks
— the others are Norton, Alice and Trixie
— had shown signs of stress. "The only thing we saw is that
occasionally they wouldn’t eat," Mr. Swanagan said. "But it was never
serious."
As some 20 veterinarians, pathologists and biologists
began a necropsy on Ralph, his online guest book swelled with affectionate
messages from fans. Many of them had never heard of a whale shark before
the aquarium became the first outside Asia to exhibit them.
"We will miss you, Ralph," wrote the "Kinard kids"
of Oxford, Ga. "To be so big and to be so nice at the same time."
Bob Roberts of Atlanta was nostalgic: "I remember when
we first met and you swam by me — our eyes
met — and it was like we had known each
other our entire lives."
Ralph was the second highly publicized attraction at the
aquarium to die this month; a beluga whale that had been seriously ill
died on Jan. 2.
Whale sharks, which can exceed 50 feet in length, are
rare.
Little is known about their social habits, migration
patterns or even their life span and food intake.
"Relative to other species, sharks are very poorly
understood," said Robert Hueter, a pre-eminent shark expert who was
attending the necropsy, and whose research in the wild is partly financed
by the Georgia Aquarium.
"Relative to other species of sharks, the whale shark is
even more poorly understood."
Dr. Hueter, director of the Center for Shark Research at
the Mote Marine Laboratory in Sarasota, Fla., said he had not yet seen any
obvious pathology. "There’s been no ‘aha’ moment yet," he said. "It’s
always possible that we’ll never know."
Scientists are beguiled by the whale shark’s habit of
diving deep into frigid water, as deep as 4,000 feet, Dr.
Hueter said. No one knows if they are seeking food, trying to rid
themselves of parasites, cooling off, resting or reveling.
But scientists like Rachel Graham, who has researched
whale sharks in Belize, point out that such dives cannot be replicated in
a fish tank.
"Let us continue our push for global whale shark
conservation so that populations may be protected and in some areas
restored following overfishing," Dr. Graham wrote in a mass e-mail message
to her colleagues in August 2005, criticizing the Atlanta exhibit. "Global
protection will then render obsolete the excuse of procuring whale sharks
for aquariums in lieu of fishing and leave these animals where they
belong, in the open ocean."
Marie Levine, the executive director of the Shark
Research Institute in Princeton, N.J., initially opposed the whale shark
exhibit in Atlanta because the aquarium intended to take the sharks from a
wildlife sanctuary, and because so many whale sharks have died in
captivity in Asia.
But Ms. Levine softened when the aquarium bought
juveniles, which are more adaptable, from Taiwanese fishermen, who can
take a limited number each year, most of which are destined for the dining
table.
"It was really a rescue," she said, "and they certainly
gave those animals excellent care."
Brenda Goodman contributed reporting.
Restaurants: Local grapevine is that a Chinese restaurant will be
located on the site of BJ's Restaurant - certainly a fancy building going up
in that location. Also, we understand that Simone is building a pizza
restaurant on the Placencia Road near MNM Hardware - directly across the
road into the Lagoon subdivision from another new Chinese restaurant.
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