Vexed Bermoothes

As I commented earlier, the Government is putting the cart before the horse on the Club Med redevelopment by asking to Bermuda to debate what were are giving away without knowing what we will get for it.
It is irresponsible to conduct the debate without clarity on the economic benefits to Bermuda derived from the lease [...]

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FreshieBlog points out that Parliament will reconvene this Friday to debate a special bill to permit the conversion of the Club Med property and St George’s public golf club into a new real estate development.
There are a lot of unanswered questions about this deal, which will turn public-owned land into a private development for 262 [...]

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As part of the Club Med demolition, over the next two months more than 28,000 tonnes of construction debris will be trucked away and dumped in Castle Harbour at the Airport.  That is approximately 3-4000 loads of the big 6 yard trucks going into the inland water.  No environmental review or long term plan.

Even [...]

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There’s plenty of blame to go around for the demise of Bermuda’s retail district. 
There’s the Government that would not listen to the warnings on the need to reform tourism approaches, tax structures, hiring laws, etc.  There’s the Corporation of Hamilton that is just … incompetent.  There’s the economic incentive for landlords to convert their retail [...]

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The following is a telling slip of the tongue from the developer of the Sonesta/Wyndham site.
Scout Real Estate Capital CEO Alan Worden announced today that work on its new 5-star resort hotel on the site of the old Wyndham Beach Resort in Southampton Parish is progressing on schedule. Scout intends to present its proposed plans [...]

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The Bermuda Cement Company fiasco has faded from the public consciousness.  But from the pocketbook?
Another factor which has contributed to the rising cost of construction, according to Mr. DeCouto, has been the increase in the price of cement by MaxCem since it took over the Bermuda Cement Company in December last year, with prices for [...]

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Yesterday’s paper had a chirpy and cheery update from a local real estate agent.
The article claims that the average cost of a single family home is now just under a million. Meanwhile a January 2007 article from the same agency put the price at 1.325 million. That implies the average sales price of [...]

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It does not make sense to me that our Government invests huge sums every year in projects like the African Diaspora Trail, that are so remote from lives of Bermudians and unlikely to contribute to our community or economy, but will not make any effort to preserve elements of our own local black history.
Like Cobbs [...]

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Alexandrina Hall on Court Street is in danger of falling to the wrecking ball.
It must be preserved. We may not wish to extend the practise of “listing” historic buildings to Hamilton, but we have to put our foot down sometimes.
Not only is this building a unique part of Hamilton’s architectural heritage, it has played [...]

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Buried under the hoopla of the big resort announcements was a little gift to the developers from the Bermuda Government.
In last week’s Official Gazette was a notice of a change in the tax that non-Bermudians must pay when they acquire land in Bermuda.

The acquisition tax on “normal” houses goes up from 22% to 25% and [...]

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