No word on talks concerning the future of Caneel Bay Resort at Virgin Islands National Park/Carolyn Sugg via Flickr
Three years after two hurricanes trampled Virgin Islands National Park, and three years before a critical date guiding the future of Caneel Bay Resort at the national park arrives, Interior Department officials say they're continuing to try to find common ground with the resort's current operator.
In September 2023, the 170 acres that the resort is set on are to be turned over to the National Park Service. That was the intent and wish of the late Laurance S. Rockefeller, who in 1956 donated the land for Virgin Islands National Park. While he held back the 170 acres for a resort, in 1983 Rockefeller signed an agreement with the Interior Department that specified that the 170 acres go to the park at the end of September 2023.
Despite Rockefeller's agreement with the federal government, his stated desire for Caneel Bay Resort's future with the National Park Service has not advanced smoothly.
In 2004, CBI Acquisitions acquired the right to operate the resort from the Jackson Hole Preserve, a nonprofit entity the Rockefellers had created to pursue their conservation interests, and turned it into a tony destination on the white-sand shore of Caneel Bay where nightly rates in recent years reached $600 and more.
Six years later, in 2010, Congress directed the Park Service to study whether it made sense to turn the Rockefeller's RUE -- retained use estate -- that governed the management of Caneel Bay Resort into a more typical concessions operation once it expired. Four years later, the Park Service study said that was the best way to move forward after September 2023.
But while the Park Service has tried to negotiate a concessions lease with CBI, the company's principal, Gary Engle, simultaneously has tried to find a way to extend the RUE for at least six decades.
Further complicating matters were studies in 2012 and 2014 that pointed to possible environmental contamination on the resort's property related to decades-old dumping grounds, fuel tanks, underground storage tanks, and maintenance facilities. Those wastes "may pose a potential threat to the public through direct exposure," a 2017 consultant's report stated.
Attempts to do more intensive environmental studies, including drilling for soil samples to judge the scope of any hazardous wastes, in the past have been stymied by Engle, according to a 2017 Park Service document. Over the course of the past three years, the Park Service and Interior officails have declined to say specifically whether their environmental consultants have gained access to the resort grounds.
"Environmental stewardship and the recovery of the Caneel Bay resort remains a top priority of the Department of the Interior and to the residents of the island of St. John," the Traveler was told Friday by Barbara Wainman, the assistant director of external affairs for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service currently on loan to Rob Wallace, Interior's assistant secretary for Fish, Wildlife and Parks.
"The National Park Service is in contact with the resort owner and is hopeful the issues presented by the closed resort can be addressed," she added in an email.
The resort closed after hurricanes Irma and Maria devastated it in September 2017, and the facilities remain in shambles. That adds another complicating factor to the current negotiations, as rebuilding guest facilities won't happen overnight. If CBI simply walks away from the RUE in September 2023, will it be held liable for rebuilding the facilities, or providing the Park Service with the necessary funds to do so? And what about any environmental contamination on the grounds? Who will be responsible for dealing with that issue?
Answers to those questions have not surfaced publicly.
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