Virgin Islands Real Estate Trends

Attention-grabbing promotions and productive partnerships with the private sector are on the itinerary - along with bold changes such as closing the first of the Tourism Department's offshore offices on June 1, she said.

Doty and the department's contracted advertising and public-relations agencies outlined their 2007-08 plans to well more than 100 hoteliers, tour operators, airline executives, media members and others at the V.I. Hotel and Tourism Association's 14th annual Destination Symposium at Marriott's Frenchman's Reef Resort.

The public-sector presentations are highlights of the event, which brings dozens of U.S. tourism packagers and promoters together with local industry representatives for four days of strategy sessions and fun island activities.

This year's presentations were a clever takeoff on the airline theme, complete with boarding passes and travel-size toiletry gift packs for audience members. Several University of the Virgin Islands students, dressed in white shorts and blouses with bright madras sashes and espadrilles, acted as "flight attendants" at the start.

The Tourism Department's goal is to increase the number of airline visitors by 6 percent over the next 12 months, advertising account director Sebastian Benjamin said. In accordance with V.I. Bureau of Economic Research statistics that show roughly 671,000 passengers arrived in the Virgin Islands in 2006, the targeted increase would be about 40,000 people.

The territory's marketing companies are the same as in years past.

This is the sixth year that ad agency J. Walter Thompson has promoted the Virgin Islands from Atlanta and the third year that public relations firm M Booth & Associates has done so from New York.

Both were re-selected earlier this year for one-year contracts with a one-year option to renew by a team that included V.I. Property and Procurement Department and Tourism officials, Doty said. J. Walter Thompson's contract is worth $1.2 million, while M Booth's is $1.8 million.

"Consistency is important," Doty said of the selections. "We also felt that these two teams emerged as having the base of knowledge about the U.S. Virgin Islands and the energy to promote our destination, along with cutting-edge concepts that they came to the table with."

The work the firms are charged to do now has shifted, however.

The changes were evidenced by the fact that Benjamin and PR account manager Brad Laney made an integrated presentation for the first time. The companies now have been asked to synchronize their plans from the start and to work closely with owners and managers of local resorts and attractions, their representatives said.

Among the plans Doty, Benjamin, Laney and on-island communications director Allegra Kean-Moorehead described:

- Continuing to push a "90th anniversary" summer package that offers a fifth night free at participating resorts, along with a series of complimentary gifts. The offering, which ties in with the recent 90th anniversary of the transfer of possession of the islands from Danish to U.S. hands, has generated about 100 bookings since it was announced several weeks ago, Doty said. The goal is 1,500 bookings by summer's end.

- Launching a new website, www.usvi-ideas.com, on which anyone can send ideas to the Tourism Department about how to improve the local tourism industry. The site went live on Monday. The department's main website also will be redesigned during the coming months.

- Targeting specific segments of the travel market with high potential for the Virgin Islands, including African Americans, scuba divers, romantic travelers, meeting and incentive groups and baby boomers.

- Closing the department's offshore offices, first in Los Angeles this month, and eventually in Atlanta, Chicago and other major cities as their leases expire. The department will shift to a more mobile sales force, using the money saved on rent for hiring more sales representatives. A new sales director, Loán Sewer, started her new job on Tuesday.

- Developing a program over the next six to nine months to collect more thorough data about V.I. visitors.

- Hiring a Danish marketing firm to perform advertising, public relations and sales promotions in Denmark. With input from the private sector, a company recently was selected, and that contract is being finalized, Doty said.

- Capitalizing on the trend toward "babymoons," or trips that expectant couples make before becoming parents. Later this year, shoppers at maternity-wear stories including Motherhood Maternity, Mothers Work and A Pea in the Pod will receive a gift bag with a V.I. vacation offer.

- Hosting two big magazine shoots on St. Croix: one for a 15- to 20-page editorial and photo spread in Bridal Guide magazine, and one 10- to 12-page section in a yet-to-be-announced publication that is said to reach 67 million readers.

- Inviting travel writers on a St. Croix-specific press trip, with the theme of "Uncover St. Croix: From Columbus to Cruzan Rum."

- Continuing the "No passport required" initiatives to keep the public informed that although the documents are now needed for most Caribbean islands, they are not necessary for travel to the Virgin Islands. Media still are interested in the change, particularly to track whether travel to some islands does decrease, Laney said. That interest is expected to last for about another year.

The private-sector response to the plans described Tuesday was enthusiastic.

"Feel that blowing through the room? That's fresh air," V.I. Hotel and Tourism Association president Rik Blyth said after the Tourism Department speeches.

In past years, the department's presentations provided a look at advertising and PR efforts that local hoteliers had not necessarily known about, said Sid Kalmans, who owns the Hotel Caravelle on St. Croix. Now, he said, hoteliers have constant contact and input into the plans. Kalmans recently participated in the review team that chose a Danish marketing firm for the Virgin Islands, for instance.

"They have new surprises, but it's not in a vacuum," he said. "It's not, 'Here's what we're doing.' It's 'Here's what we're all doing."

Also on Tuesday, V.I. Hotel and Tourism Association marketing director Luana Wheatley presented a new informational video showing Virgin Islands resort properties that can be shown to travel agents.

The association's Cooperative Marketing Initiative - a pool of hotel-promotion funds - is up to $700,000 and includes 11 V.I. properties along with allied members."

We're all looking for a breath of fresh air for our islands. Don't you agree?

AS reported by the Daily News:

A plan that would allow Great St. James - an ecologically rich island long valued by boaters, environmentalists, snorkelers and fishermen - to eventually be developed for dozens of high-end homes met public skepticism Thursday night.

Christian Kjaer, a resident of Europe and who along with several relatives owns the 162-acre island one mile off St. Thomas' southeast coast, has applied for a major Coastal Zone Management permit to subdivide its land into 53 lots that would be sold for about $750,000 each.

Landowners could build homes by securing minor CZM permits, and current plans call for each residence to include its own cistern, sewage treatment system and generator for power, project representative William Karr said Thursday at a public hearing before the St. Thomas Coastal Zone Management Committee.

Great St. James' best-known feature is Christmas Cove, a popular mooring site that Red Hook Community Alliance member Sandra Tate on Thursday called "one of the most captivating, locally accessible and well-known anchorages in the Caribbean."

The island and its flora, fauna and marine life make it a "natural treasure of the Virgin Islands" that "should not be exploited for the profit and pleasure of a few at the expense of the many," Tate said.

Great St. James is part of a territorial Marine Reserve and Wildlife Sanctuary approved in 1994. Its land includes features used by an abundance of wildlife, including six salt ponds used by land and fiddler crabs and at least 12 species of birds, a beach used as a nesting area for the endangered green sea turtle and lush vegetation that serves as habitat for the endangered Virgin Islands tree boa.

Karr said his client intends to build absorbent grass-seeded roadways with sand underlay rather than paved ones on the island. All the "typical, normal, standard" mitigation measures, such as hand-clearing before beginning construction, would be used to minimize the impact on wildlife such as the tree boa, he said.

The Great St. James Village, a set of historic ruins of 17 structures, would be preserved in a parklike area, Karr said. The island also includes a well, dry-laid stone and coral walls and an agrave site.

Shallow barges with drop-down ramps would bring heavy construction equipment to an appropriate spot at the north end of the bay, he said, so no pile-driving or other building in the water would be necessary.

Along with the Red Hook Community Alliance, representatives of the St. Thomas Fishermen's Association, the Environmental Association of St. Thomas-St. John and the League of Women Voters were among those who testified to a string concerns about the proposal at Thursday's hearing.

EAST member Dalma Simon said that in snorkeling all over the Virgin Islands since high school, he has seen shorelines like the one at Neljeberg deteriorate over the years.

Simon said that runoff could similarly destroy Christmas Cove, which he described as vibrant with sea life, surprising underwater caves and the most grouper he has ever seen in one place.

"If there's an area you want to go to that's close to heaven, it's Christmas Cove," Simon said. "I see a lot of people in here - we don't want to see it destroyed. Get a chance, go out there, before you make any decisions. Believe me, it is heaven on earth."

Absent from Thursday's hearing were representatives of the numerous charter yachts and day-sail companies who deliver V.I. visitors to Christmas Cove daily for snorkeling and picnicking.

Simon and others, however, pointed to the island's long-term value for the tourism industry as another reason to preserve it.

Committee member Peggy Simmonds questioned why homes could not be clustered more in the development to preserve more green space, rather than spread across the entire island.

Karr responded by saying that such clustering could require a group-dwelling permit and rezoning, which could be a time-consuming process. He said that the homes would be built to environmentally friendly energy standards.

Three modest, green-roofed homes built decades ago already sit on the island, Karr said. He acknowledged that others might be designed differently, however. "As it relates to what might happen in the future, I can't speak to that," he said. "I can speak to what my client is doing today. I've had clients sell properties and things change."

Karr differed with community groups who said they did not see a certification letter from the V.I. State Historic Preservation Office and other necessary documentation from stakeholder agencies in the project file. The project does have such clearance from the preservation office, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the Army Corps of Engineers for its mitigation plans, Karr said.

In other testimony, Bill Rohring, former CZM assistant director, contended that his name was improperly listed as consulting on the environmental assessment report. Rohring said he had not been contacted by the developer or provided with any information for the report.