By NEIL HARTNELL

Tribune Business Editor

nhartnell@tribunemedia.net

A well-known Eleuthera school’s founder is urging Disney to help The Bahamas escape “neocolonial tourism” by converting its Lighthouse Point cruise destination into a sustainable “land and sea park”.

Christopher Maxey, the Cape Eleuthera-based Island School’s founder, acknowledged in an April 6, 2021, letter to Walt Disney Company’s new chairman, Robert Chapek, that he was making “a bold and presumptuous request”.

Conceding that Disney already owns the 700-acre peninsula on Eleuthera’s southern tip, he wrote: “We believe there can be an alternative development plan that brings great value to Disney, to our neighbours in South Eleuthera and to our ocean planet.

“In place of a cruise ship destination, we respectfully encourage Disney to establish with the Bahamian government a Disney Land and Sea Legacy Park that can be sustained as a pristine, beautiful place for generations to come.

“In addition, might there be an opportunity to build a Disney Research and Innovation campus that helps bring leaders from around the world to learn and live as part of a small eco-village, designed and celebrated in the Disney tradition.”

The Island School is world-renowned for teaching high school students from across the globe about sustainable 21st century living, and Mr Maxey urged that Disney focus on similar initiatives at Lighthouse Point rather than go through with its cruise destination plans.

“We believe that educational tourism (Disney Research and Executive Training Centre) has, in the long run, the opportunity to bring greater value to Disney and to the economy of South Eleuthera. The Cape Eleuthera Island School, our partners at One Eleuthera/CTI and Leon Levy Nature Preserve, have proven that the educational/eco-tourism model can have far reaching and lasting benefits,” he said.

“We, at the Cape Eleuthera Island School, stand ready to celebrate and support a Disney Center for Research and Innovation at Lighthouse Point, Eleuthera. We realise this is a bold and presumptuous request. I welcome an opportunity to be at a table and listen and help support solutions.

“We also welcome you and your team to come visit Eleuthera, walk the magical seascape at Lighthouse and feel the opportunity to help The Bahamas shift away from a traditional neocolonial tourist economy toward a more equitable investment in place and culture.”

It is unlikely that Disney will be moved at such a late stage to alter its plans, having thus far refused to budge despite a well-publicised pressure campaign by Bahamian environmental activists. Several groups referenced by Mr Maxey, including the One Eleuthera Foundation, were also involved with a rival proposal for sustainably developing the 700-acre site.

Disney’s big advantage was always that it had a sales agreement in place with Lighthouse Point’s previous owner to acquire the property, while the One Eleuthera Foundation did not. Shaun Ingraham, the One Eleuthera Foundation’s (OEF) chief executive, told Tribune Business in 2018 that its own efforts to acquire the site had been rebuffed.

A press release issued by environmental activists yesterday quoted James Lima, a sustainable development executive who worked closely with the Leon Levy Foundation and One Eleuthera on the 2018 proposal, as telling an April 15 meeting: “We found that a plan centred around educational and ecotourism, stay-over-tourism, at a very small footprint of the site would generate 27 times greater economic benefit for The Bahamas than the proposed Disney plan, and would create significantly more local jobs and year-round jobs.”

Ben Simmons, the Harbour Island hotelier who was also involved with the 2018 initiative, added: “I own two small hotels on Eleuthera and I am a strong believer that small, low-impact development is key to a sustainable economy that employs more people and is better prepared to deal with economic shocks.

“South Eleuthera already has a cruise port at Princess Cay and actually has the highest number of visitors on the island, but none of the economic benefits have gone to the people who actually live there. Who’s to say this is going to be any different? Disney needs to do better than what they are currently proposing.”