By LEANDRA ROLLE

Tribune Chief Reporter

lrolle@tribunemedia.net

LEON Lundy refused to name the developer of a major project on Athol Island even as St Anne’s MP Adrian White renewed concerns about the project’s environmental impact in the House of Assembly.

Mr White raised alarm about the project in the House earlier this month, saying it had severe environmental implications.

He claimed that piles of barge and sand had been deposited on the island and that native limestone had been demolished to create a path across much of the island.

Mr Lundy, the MP for Central and South Andros and a state minister in the Office of the Prime Minister, did not say how much land was leased to the developer, but claimed yesterday that environmental approvals were given in February despite contrary claims by leading environment officials.

“He could check the records,” Mr Lundy said. “I wouldn’t give the person’s name in the House, but there is someone who got the lease, and they do have the environmental clearing to do what they’re doing over there.”  

Last week, Dr Rhianna Neely-Murphy, head of the Department of Environmental Planning and Protection, told Tribune Business that no environmental approvals had been given to a developer or project on Athol Island. 

 Mr White raised Dr Neely’s statements yesterday and questioned how approvals could be given to people who harm the environment “on an act first, ask later basis”.

 “The director, the woman in charge of ensuring that the proper environmental planning are in place to give approvals for any project, is now being represented by the member of South and Central Andros to have given approvals to this project after the partings were embedded in a marine sea protected habitat,” he said.

 Mr Lundy said he would lay a document to prove his claim, but he did not do so during yesterday’s morning sitting.

 “This isn’t private information,” Mr White rebutted. “Give us the name of the person or the entity that has that Crown lease if, in fact, you have it as you have disclosed to the members of the public today in this honourable House. Stop telling the people that they don’t need to know what they don’t need to know.”

 The Davis administration has not publicly announced any projects for the island, but multiple Bahamian investors have long wanted to develop the area.

 Mr White said yesterday: “What is even more significant now is that there is a pier, Mr Deputy Speaker, not even a dock, not even a floating dock, but there is a pier, which to my eyes from the photos I’ve seen, stretch some two hundred feet maybe 200 yards.”

 “That pier has dock pilings that go into the sea bed. They don’t rest on top of the surface of the water like a floating dock might, but they’re in the protected marine area.”

 “At the end of that, there looks like some shanty shack –– the ones that the good member for Central and South Eleuthera has been bulldozing down throughout the Family Islands. There’s a shanty shack at the end of that pier which some suspect may be the location for the toilet facilities.” 

 Mr White said it would be an “absolute absurdity” and a blemish on the government if environmental approvals were given for the project. 

 “You’re building this for multiple persons that are going to be soaked in sunscreen that will impact the marine habitat, the coral (and) the small fish in that area,” he said. “This, Mr Deputy Speaker, is the true legacy of the PLP.”