My Letter regarding Paul Golden
(Also sent to the Source, the Avis and The Daily News)
As a person who fell in love with St. Croix the first time I landed at the Alexander Hamilton Airport in 1987, has lived here, raised my daughter here, worked myriad jobs (menial, professional and managerial), has done countless hours of volunteer work, and continues to try to promote the beauty and uniqueness of our island home, I must speak, yet again, about the potential damage that Paul Golden’s casino, convention center, golf course and “resort” will do to this amazing place.
There are a group of swimmers who get together every Saturday morning to swim from one point to another at various beaches around St. Croix. I have swum with them for over 10 years. One of the swims takes the participants from Robin Bay (east of Mt. Fancy) to the Boy Scout Camp. It can be a fabulous swim. The patch reefs in the Great Pond Bay, as well as the barrier reef, harbor innumerable species of colorful sea life. The waters are fresh and clear, until you get to the beach where Paul Golden wants to build this abomination. The beach may look nice from land, but it is murky and full of smelly seaweed once you get to the spot where this “resort” is proposed. The current takes a lot of yucky stuff to that particular beach.
During certain times of the year, the place smells like septic. The aroma of decaying vegetation in the area as part of the natural processes of a wetland/saltpond, aka swamp is prevalent. My belief is that Paul Golden was sold the proverbial, “Prime swampland in St. Croix that my buddies and I have been holding onto for just someone like you…” And that may be why we see former Senator David Jones’ face at every Golden hearing trying to dissuade naysayers like me, who actually know what the area is like and have had many years of contact with stateside tourists.
My business depends largely on tourism and I know the typical “golf resort/casino tourist” will definitely not enjoy their stay at this resort. But Golden does not want to look like an idiot who’s been sold a bill of goods, which is why he perseveres.
I can only imagine the pampered American tourist holding her nose walking from the beach to the golf course (or more likely being chauffeured in a fancy golf cart) to complain to her husband about the “awful smell of St. Croix” and wanting to go to Aruba or St. Martin.
St. Croix is a breathtakingly unspoiled gem with so much more potential than to be just another overdeveloped Caribbean island who has sold out to some (or a few) scam artist(s).
Let’s take better care of her and not let this happen.
Tags: , fin folk, Great Pond Bay, island home, Paul Golden, St. Croix, swimmers, Terry Talk, wetlands
February 28th, 2008 at 7:09 am
Terry..help me..is that south shore?
February 28th, 2008 at 11:54 am
It is on the south shore. Directly across from the Great Pond Mini-mart, heading toward the water between there and the boy scout camp.
February 29th, 2008 at 7:09 am
How did he get resurrected from the dead, disqualified and fundless, to THIS again!!!!! Urgh……
Something smelly not just in Great Pond.
Follow the ” Green ” line.
February 29th, 2008 at 9:51 am
Well, PFA granted him the convention center contract again. It’s very strange, their primary conditions for choosing Golden’s project were that he was further through the process (of CZM permitting, etc.) than other projects and that he needed it most! So it was a “lets give it to the project that is least likely to succeed on its own” decision.
As for his alleged CZM permits, its all a sham. He got the permit by default, not because he was in compliance with the CZM laws and rules. He claims he’s in compliance, but has filed a court action to prevent CZM from reviewing whether or not thats true. Why would someone “fully in compliance”, but “plagued with legal issues” add to his legal battles trying to keep the regulatory body, whose job it is to confirm he is in compliance, from reviewing his case? Can you say double-speak?
Regarding his funding, he spoke in circles about that at the conference too. He threw out a couple numbers including our $32.5 million from the PFA, and $57 point-something million from his “partners” and some unclaimed number of millions that Wyndham has promised, then claim they added up to $150 million in equity in the project, WITHOUT any financing. He stressed the NO financing, all our OWN money and assets thing a couple times. Turns out his “partner” is a High Risk Debt hedge fund, Jericho All-Weather Opportunity Fund, which promises “steady double digit return stream” that “appears to come principally from real estate projects paying interest rates that, while somewhat short of usurious, imply either a higher-than-usual degree of risk, or a lower-than-usual negotiating ability among borrowers” (source Naked Shorts - Alternative thoughts on alternative investments)
If thats not financing, what is it? Loan-sharking? High-end high interest loans to real estate developers with poor or no credit.
February 29th, 2008 at 2:41 pm
Thanks for the lengthy extrapolation. He was stopped once before, can it happen again?
Can we topple his ” house of Cards ?”
March 28th, 2008 at 6:37 pm
Paul Golden’s project would be much better located in the Watcho Estate Diamond Keturah area. When the Gasperi family sold the property at Estate Hartmann the use they believed it would have is a golf course which would be on high ground.
Among the reasons they said that they sold it was that at certain times of of the year it even gets dangerous to pasture cattle there.
Instead the same part of the property which was causing leg sprains in cattle is being their billed by Paul Golden as the site of a new hotel.
The higher ground at Hartmann could be a golf course and air strip so St. Thomians can fly in for golf. The lower ground at Hartmann should be a conservation area a zoo maybe not a hotel and condo.
I knew the Governor growing up and am related to Cecile. I do not know why he is supporting this hotel project at this site. I guess every USVI Governor feels that he needs his own version of Prosser.
March 28th, 2008 at 8:16 pm
Thanks for reading, Richard.
In my opinion, Paul Golden should go back to where he came from. We don’t need another criminal in these parts.
We respect our new Governor and believe that he knew that Golden was “dead in the water”, but didn’t want to appear anti-development.
As we are seeing, the pomp and circumstance Golden demonstrates is some sort of “razzle dazzle” to pull the wool over everyones’ eyes so they can’t see the truth. He has a LOOONG way to go, still, and when the CZM board really looks at his “application” rather than bowing to pressure from XYZ, he will not make the grade.