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“Cayman Gone”: Closed-Door Decisions and Foreign Investors Drive an Island Identity Crisis

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Few places in Grand Cayman offer the expansive, open views of the Caribbean Sea like those seen from the top floor of The WaterColours condominiums.  

To start, most places lack this elevation. On an island with an average altitude of six feet, it’s a luxury to take in the turquoise waters and white sand beaches from a 10th-story perspective. 

Until recently, only this complex, a 2014 creation of luxury developer Fraser Wellon, and Kimpton Seafire Resort by the Dart group, the islands’ largest private landowner, had achieved such heights. That’s soon to change, but for now, this particular sea view, from the top-floor penthouse of the late Jamaican tourism mogul Ernest “Ernie” Smatt, remains one of Grand Cayman’s most elite. The complex is just one of dozens of luxury condominiums that have filled in Grand Cayman’s vulnerable coastline over the past decade. During the COVID-19 crisis, construction of such projects has accelerated, exposing the local population to serious climate change threats in exchange for properties most Caymanians cannot aspire to own in a lifetime.

Series

A Loss of ‘Caymankind’ and Island Ethos

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The Beach Club Colony days were a different era for Cayman. In 1970, the Cayman Islands had just over 9,100 residents and many of those, in particular young men, spent their time at sea, working ships with the National Bulk Carriers, a multinational shipping company. The financial services industry was in its nascent days, as was tourism. In 1968, a stay at the Beach Club would have cost between US $10.50 and US $15.50 a night — a rate that included two meals a day. The 36-room resort was among Seven Mile Beach’s earliest accommodations, alongside the Coral Caymanian, Galleon Beach Hotel and La Fontaine, all since redeveloped.

Department of Education

Department of Education Is Planning a New Wave of School Closings

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The Puerto Rico Department of Education’s (DE) “vision of the future” proposes the closing of another 83 schools by 2026, affecting 18,644 students, according to a new infrastructure master plan to which the Center for Investigative Journalism (CPI, in Spanish) had access, although in May 2021 Interim Secretary Eliezer Ramos Parés pledged that the agency would not close more campuses. Most of these closings, which the Department calls “consolidations” in the document and which are displayed on an interactive map created by the DE, are in the educational regions of Humacao, Ponce and San Juan. Humacao and Ponce, preceded by Mayagüez and San Juan, were the regions that saw the most closings in the past four years, under the administration of the former secretary and now federal convict, Julia B. Keleher. Although the plan identifies some as receivers schools, it does not specify from which closed campus they will receive students. Document: “Vision of the future” of the Department of Education of Puerto RicoDownload

These new proposed closings clash with teacher unions’ demands for more space to guarantee small groups of students in the face of the COVID-19 rebound, as well as from other organizations and academics that have proven how the quality of teaching improves through these practices.

Center for Investigative Journalism

Center for Investigative Journalism at the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights Briefing

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Good morning. I appreciate the opportunity to talk in this Public Briefing of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights on the Civil Rights Implications of Disaster Relief: Hurricane María in Puerto Rico. I hope that this becomes a productive forum in which we are not only heard, but that can be linked to solutions to the problems and injustices that are brought to your attention. My name is Carla Minet, and I am the executive director of the Center for Investigative Journalism (Centro de Periodismo Investigativo, or CPI in Spanish). 

The CPI is a nonprofit news organization celebrating 15 years of doing incisive investigative journalism, training journalists in Puerto Rico and the Caribbean and litigating for access to public records. We have a team of five journalists that has been devoted permanently for the past four years to investigating the recovery process after hurricanes Irma and María.

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covid-19 haiti

The Setbacks of the Management of COVID-19 in Haiti

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Without massive testing and no comprehensive mortality statistics, it is impossible to quantify how many people have been infected and died of COVID-19 in Haiti. But one thing is certain, Haitian health authorities have not had control over the spread of the virus in the country.