Cruise pier partnership a tough lesson for territory
From the start, government poorly handled the proposed cruise pier project that was terminated last week. However, leaders now have an opportunity to regroup, provide the public with more information, and solicit community input before transparently deciding the way forward.
The proposed development was unveiled at a public meeting in June 2012. At the time, Communications and Works Minister Mark Vanterpool announced that government had decided to work with the United States-based consortium Tortola Ports Partners on a $75 million project that would include a pier extension and major landside development on Wickhams Cay.
However, the project had not been tendered. This omission seemed quite clearly to violate the Protocols for Effective Financial Management, which had been signed in April of that year.
Government soon admitted as much: That August, Premier Dr. Orlando Smith put the project on hold. Then bids were invited in accordance with the Protocols’ requirement that tendering precede major public-private initiatives.
The subsequent bidding process apparently did not go smoothly. A contender, Royal Caribbean Cruise Lines, angrily complained, claiming that TPP was favoured from the start — an allegation government denied.
Besides these concerns, the project may have violated the Protocols in other respects: The rules also call for an “appraisal and business case” and a “robust cost-benefit analysis” before the procurement stage. If such studies were carried out for the TPP project, they were never made public.
For that matter, neither was the environmental impact assessment, even though the scientist who conducted it hosted a community meeting in August.
Thus, the public was left to take leaders’ word that the benefits of the pier project would outweigh the costs. Considering government’s track record, it is hardly surprising that many residents were sceptical: The development proved controversial, with some stakeholders arguing that it was entirely unnecessary.
In August, the premier said government had submitted information about the proposal to the United Kingdom for consideration. But on Friday, he released a short, vaguely worded statement announcing the termination of the TPP partnership. Government, he said, will now collaborate with the BVI Ports Authority to develop the pier.
Mr. Vanterpool blamed the cancellation on TPP, which he said had failed to meet certain conditions necessary to proceed.
Now the public is left with many unanswered questions, not the least of which is why TPP was chosen in the first place. Ultimately, too many decisions appear to have been made behind the scenes.
Moving forward, a proper business case and cost-benefit analysis should be completed by reputable experts — or, if these studies already exist, they should be released to the public. The EIA, too, should be released, though we would caution that it should not be considered a substitute for the other analyses.
After these documents are in the public domain, the community should be given an opportunity to weigh in before government proceeds.
A cruise pier development may well benefit the territory, but we see no reason why the public shouldn’t be privy to the same information as the leaders who have been making this claim so insistently.
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