The Tribune

A UNIQUE thing happened this week. Amid the horror played out on TV screens of violence rocking the Middle East with innocent men, women and children being captured and slaughtered, entire cities and villages burned and destroyed, amidst the burial of a revered Bahamian Cabinet minister who suffered an untimely and shocking death and amidst the tearful memorial for the head boy at QC who died before he had a chance to live, there was a bright and shining light.

The Bahamian public, usually so docile, stood up, spoke out and won.

Atlantis’s proposal to use Montagu as a landing strip for its seaplanes to take guests on Family Island excursions was shot down before it ever got off the ground.

And well it should have been.

That is not said as an anti-Atlantis sentiment. I consider both president Audrey Oswell and senior vice president Vaughn Roberts friends, with the latter someone I worked with and respected for years. More importantly, Atlantis has been a friend of and to The Bahamas since the early 1990s when the late Sol Kerzner saw the potential of an aging resort and totally transformed and expanded it to the largest private employer in the country. With local leadership in most roles, it was Atlantis that came to the rescue in times of need, helped buoy communities with parks and playgrounds and computer equipment and before BahaMar it was Atlantis that welcomed Bahamians who were celebrating reunions and graduations.

That said, when the best of people or institutions has an idea that stinks, it deserves to sink before it ever rises. In this case, the proposal to use Montagu foreshore and Montagu Bay as a hub and landing strip for seaplanes, it was an idea that deserved to be grounded before it ever had lift-off.

No one is criticising Atlantis for the concept of broadening the guest experience. As the property shows its age, forcing it to compete harder for guests, it makes good sense to increase the guest experience with options for excursions to both Spanish Wells and Kamalame Cay. In fact, it makes a lot of very attractive business sense. A partnership with a seaplane company makes it even more attractive. Stay at Atlantis and see more of The Bahamas.

The only problem with the new competitive edge curve was the crazy idea that the seaplanes that would deliver guests to those destinations would land and take off from a bay where every day dozens of people swim, where on holidays those numbers swell to the hundreds, where several days a week kids from all over New Providence put their Optis or Sunfish in the water and learn how to sail – carrying on the tradition of what was recently named the national sport. How can anyone entertain the idea of operating a plane, seaplane or otherwise, in the midst of a public park and swim area?

Sure, I am extraordinarily passionate about Montagu, the foreshore that several of us worked tirelessly for one year to save, under then MP for the area Loretta Butler-Turner’s directive, is a precious treasure to be enjoyed by and preserved for the Bahamian public.

We spent endless hours campaigning to revitalise the area, expand its capacity, landscape the southern side, create a quarter mile of parking, build restrooms, provide proper facilities for fishers, including running water. The revitalisation gave rise to a whole new economy. No longer were fishermen fighting over tiny territory on a crowded ramp with trucks and trailers hauling boats as they tried to sell their catch from tables covered with flies.

And who covered most of the $1m cost to recover the lost area of Montagu for the pleasure of the public? Atlantis.

Atlantis money funded the restoration and revitalisation of Montagu.

Bless the folks who made it happen, including Ed Fields.

But these words are not penned to record the history of Montagu, nor are they intended to point a finger at the entity that was close to taking away the public park, green space, swimming, sailing and recreational haven its own bountiful and well-intended funding had created.

No, these words are about something even more significant – the impact of public participation.

On Tuesday evening, nearby residents and those opposed to what would have become a noisy seaplane hub stood up for their neighbourhood, their rights and they spoke out against it. They stood up for the children and teens who sail in Montagu Bay several times a week. They stood up for the Family Island residents who gather in Nassau for reunions and fundraisers. They stood up and they spoke out for what was right and they pointed out what was wrong. And they won. Acting Port Controller Berne Wright, an experienced executive who held high-ranking posts in the Royal Bahamas Defense Force, listened to those voices and denied the Atlantis proposal to use Montagu.

There are other active protests – a group of residents in Love Beach who are passionately opposed to developer Jason Kinsale’s proposed Passion Point high-rise for fear it will forever change their quiet, tranquil way of life. There may be two sides to that story as Kinsale is a successful developer whose projects provide hundreds of jobs and boost the economy, but if nearby residents protest, clamoring that the proposed project is too tall, out of character for their quaint village style, their voices may be heard.

Just as the Organisation for Responsible Government (ORG) says, you cannot complain if you do not participate.

What the lesson of the thwarted seaplane plan taught is this: when the public speaks up, when the reasoning is sound and the rule of law is obeyed, bad ideas can be silenced. As for that seaplane idea, moving it down the harbour is not a better plan. Making the ride to Odyssey and a tour of historic Nassau part of the excursion experience may make guests more eager to get out and see what lies beyond the famed resort of Atlantis.

A bird in the hand

Never has the definition of a bird in the hand been truer. This little wren flew into a window at our home this week. My husband, Larry, rescued him (her?) from the ground where I was sure it was going to perish but in the vein of never agreeing with any opinion of mine, or mostly never agreeing Larry was certain the little bird was just stunned so he held and stroked the wounded or stunned baby until it went from his hand to the table, steadied itself for a moment or two, and flew off. But I was sure I saw it look back as it made its way.