CIG to consider forcing Red Spot owner to sell beach
(CNS): The Cayman Islands Government has accepted a private member’s motion submitted by back-bench member McKeeva Bush (WBW) to consider the compulsory acquisition of two small parcels of land in the George Town Harbour where the fish market is located. Most of Red Spot (aka Dora’s Beach) is owned by Chris Johnson, who has been reluctant to sell the site to the government for a permanent fish market as he had planned to donate the land to the people as a beach for everyone to use free from commercial activity.
Local fishermen say they have been using the area to unload, clean and sell fish for decades, a claim Johnson disputes. Nevertheless, he has allowed them to use the site to sell their wares since he acquired the land in partnership with another owner in the early 1970s. In recent years, he and his family began a beautification project in the area and want to continue that work, which has been delayed by the disputes.
Johnson, a retired auditor, is keen to clean the site up so it can be enjoyed by people as a beach. Towards this, he sought to remove the fish market legally before COVID and have them move to another nearby spot. The PPM administration said the issue was resolved in December 2020 but an agreement between the parties was never implemented. Since then, the fishermen have been lobbying the CIG to seize the land and turn it into a permanent fish market.
Bush, whose motion was supported by the independent opposition member Chris Saunders (BTW), argued that local fishermen had prescriptive rights to the land given how long they had used it to ply their catch. He said it had long been the place where fishermen could make a living, where residents could buy fresh fish and was part of the country’s heritage.
Bush said the government had been trying for years to buy the land. He accused the landowner of not cooperating and said it was time for the issue to be forced through compulsory acquisition.
The government rarely uses such power except to build roads. However, Bush said it was time to create a permanent but simple island-style fish market on the spot, claiming that the community would support it. But he said he hoped that an agreement could still be made to settle the issue without legal action.
This is a long-standing matter that has spanned several administrations, and Premier Juliana O’Connor-Connolly accepted the motion but urged the owner to sell without a legal battle and offered to pay above market rate.
In a letter to all MPs, Johnson said that when he acquired the property, there was no fish market on the site. Fish was sold further along the ironshore as a weighing scale was fitted there, he said. Sometime in 2006, without his knowledge until after the fact, concrete was poured on the sand and tents were erected, from which fishmongers began selling catches brought by other fishermen.
Johnson claims that watersports businesses also improperly used the property he wanted to keep as a swimming and recreational area. He said he asked all of them to leave, which they did after he declined their offers to rent the land. In 2012, he bought an adjacent parcel, and in 2014, his son and other adjacent landowners installed a sidewalk and a retaining wall and further beautified the area a few years later.
The government approached Johnson in 2020 to ask him to sell, but he refused because his goal was to establish a trust to hold the land, prevent its development or commercial use and leave it for the Cayman people to enjoy in perpetuity. Johnson offered to let the fishermongers use a more appropriate parcel of land that he owned along the shore. This was accepted by them and the government, he said, but sometime later, the fishmongers withdrew their agreement.
Planning Minister Jay Ebanks has since approached him again to ask him to sell. But once again, Johnson said he wanted to press ahead with his plans to place the land in trust and retain it as a non-commercial beach location for the public to use. No other official approaches have been made since then, he said. He first learned about the plans for compulsory acquisition from a Cayman Compass article outlining Bush’s motion.
“In the opinion of my family and I and numerous persons I have met to discuss the matter, all believe that this motion is a dangerous precedent and will raise concerns with existing investors and have a detrimental effect on potential investors in the Cayman Islands,” he stated in the letter sent to all members.
Johnson also noted that neither the government nor the fishermen have explained why the previous agreement and the offer of using his other parcel of land have not been accepted. (See the map of the site below showing the land in question.)
Johnson has confirmed that he owns OPR 5 and that OPY 7 is owned by Shireoak Ltd, a company where the shares are held in trust for the Johnson family. OPY 189 is owned by Waterfront Centre Ltd, a company believed to be owned by Kel Thompson and his family. While OPY 189 is part of the site, Johnson questioned why the motion does not seek to compulsorily seize that parcel, only those owned by the Johnsons.
See Johnson’s letter and the PMM in the CNS Library.
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Category: Politics
I am a Generational Caymanian and I support Mr. Chris – how can I help?
How are these “fishmongers” allowed to trade without a license. Isn’t that an offense? I know there is an exemption if they caught the fish, but they didn’t. Did they?
Are DCI enforcement that inept, or worse?
The best fish is sold directly to restaurants. The stuff they sell on the beach is very overpriced and not the best. Buying fish there is dangerous because there is no fixed price and they can really rip you off.
This motion and all those who supported it, smell very much like a dictatorship. If this country dosent rid ourselves of the likes of Mckeeva, Kenneth, Jay, Juliana, Saunders- we are doomed 1000x worse than we are now. Please Cayman Islands voters- let us do what we have the power in the pencil to do on election day and that is VOTE OUT this bunch of fools. Two teats on a boar hog will be better in the LA than these slackers.
I’ve parked my car in the same parking spot at work for over a decade, does that mean I own it now as I have a prescriptive right
2 decades. With no interference. Possibly.
fish market???…i went down there looking for a tin of mackerel …and they sold me to go to kirks!!!!!
CNS, it would be very interesting to find out from Ministry of Planning or Ministry of Lands, why the western entrance/exit of the Auxillary GAB parking behind Immigration has been blocked for years.
Traffic could be eased up if that entrance/eixt was kept opened
Because sense=rocket science to CIG.
So, Mr. Johnson has been critical of Bush for years and years, particularly in regard to the First Cayman Bank fiasco and insolvency where Bush was a Director of that bank.
And Bush has always said that he would never support the use of Compulsory Acquisition against Caymanians.
But, now Bush wants to use comp acquisition against Mr. Johnson. Why?
MP Bush has, at certain times, said that he would not support compulsorily purchase of multi-generationalCaymanian’s land.
Vote Mr Johnson!
Kick these threatening ‘Caymanian MPs’, vile, inciting violence criminals out of Cayman, send them Guantanamo for their crimes! Get their attutude and arses out of Cayman! Only way to try and make beautiful again!
An extract from today’s Cayman Compass online regarding government purchasing pieces of land used by fishermen:
‘Bryan said that he backed the motion with “every atom in my body, every inch of my soul and every drop of blood in my body”.
He added, “And I hope to God that this piece of land doesn’t cause anybody else’s blood to drop”.’
These are the people Cayman wants to lead Cayman Islands???
From same:
‘The motion was moved by veteran politician McKeeva Bush, MP for West Bay West, and seconded by Bodden Town West’s Chris Saunders.
Bush added an amendment to his original notice to ensure “the possibility of a fish market” on the site.
He told MPs the area was of “significant importance” to the heritage of Cayman and that the “compulsory acquisition of Red Spot to facilitate and protect the continued sustenance of the fishing community of the Cayman Islands” should be considered.’
Huh???? Talk out of their backsides…transparency at last!
Why don’t Kenny Mac and Saunders use a portion of the very expensive Kenny beach, sitting there empty and unused.
It will at least offer some parking, and a shelter can easily be erected over the sales area. If there is going to be a tourist facility there, why not incorporate the toilets and hygiene requirements to the facility..?
If the man doesn’t want to sell, then stop bullying him.
Speaker to him to hush with his nonsense violent talk.
Most local fishermen and women have agreements with the restaurants and supermarkets to sell their catch direct. None of them utilise this “fish market”. What is sold at the location is coming for the Honduran boats who illegally fish in our unprotected economic zone and then sell the fish back to us (like the idiots we are). A good portion of illegal drugs and guns also find their way onshore from those same boats.
This is nothing more than posturing from Mac, Chris and Kenneth to catch some downtown “wotes”.
This is very concerning where a vested mob can use elected officials to grab land of individual property owners without their consent. If this is the case, then the rule of law in CI is that of a mob and individual rights don’t matter. I guess this is what democracy means these days in CI; rule of the majority over minority. Ethics and morality don’t matter anymore.
So Mr. Bush rides again, first causing the acquisition of the site of their new cruise port. He and Kenny willing to beg, borrow or steal — whatever it takes — to posess the land where the cruise port will go. What do you want to bet he is already in touch with CHEC?
Referendum? It will take another PIR to be binding. Of course, government would never allow that to happen again.
The landowner has been very generous allowing the fishermen to use his land. His plan to offer it as public access is very pleasing. If there is to be force applied, it should be to remove the fishmongers and allow the property owner to do as he wish with his property.
The proposer of this motion said “That property has been used for generations and we propose that fishermen continue to use it.”
This statement is demonstrably not true.
They are not “fishermen”, they are squatters and they have not been there for even one generation.
The Cayman Is used to try to prevent informal trading, “higglers” by another name.
Chris Johnson has always made it clear that he wants his beach to be freely used by the people of the Cayman Is and our cruise ship visitors.
Why then does the government not support his wishes and have the illegal structures built by the higglers without planning permission or coastal works permit removed as is the law of the land.
“Common good”? No!
Undermining an individual’s personal property rights whilst rewarding people who have been operating an unsanitary food service business and building illegal structures outside all regulations, thus also undermining the laws the honourable house has enacted for decades? Yes. Good job CIG.
Sorry Chris. You’re still drif’wood after 56 years here.
Buy it “for the fisherman” then kick them out and use the land for the cruise ship dock..
If I was retired and owned prime land I’d sell it. Let the government ruin it with whatever plans they have for it and I’ll be chilling somewhere else minding my own rich business.
The frozen fish from Honduras market is a better name for this place
It’s strange that no hygiene standards seem to apply here. It seems that just because of the location being very near the sea people are fooled into thinking they are buying fresh fish.
Throw them out!
The site needs to be cleaned up fully. The fish market has always been there so there is that. If Government has to step in to accomplish what others have not managed to, then so be it. Keep the fish market as a matter of Natural cultural importance.
Chris spent his own money to put in a boardwalk and tidy up the site, lets people use it for free, and wants to put it in trust so people can always enjoy the site. Kel Thompson violates planning rules to concrete and sand over the iron shore, excluding Caymanians from accessing the sea at that point unless they pay a fee, and erects his for profit business in violation of set back rules. And who gets the heavy hand of politicians – strangely enough, not the alturistic Mr Johnson, but the profit orientated Mr Thompson. Want to bet that 5 minutes after CIG compulsorily acquires that pocket beach Kel is renting access to it or flogging his cocktails and cigars there? Caymanian fisherman my left foot.
how do health inspectors allow for this to be kept open but inspect restaurants and close them for not having a staff bathroom, improper air conditioning, or no proper temperature logs… seems fishy. See what i did there.
FFS The fish sold there is caught in Honduras and brought here on ice!
Kenneth has the smallest Ministry of anybody and can’t get jack sh_t done with all this fake outrage over stupidness.
Let’s turn this attention on Kenneth and take a cold hard look at what he has accomplished in the last 3 years.
Yet we paid Bababushka friend and legal advisor and his late tourism pariah estate 5.74 million for a property that the pariah bought CI$1.8 million and when we question the purchase we were told it was worth even more US$7.9 0r CI$6.15 and we were getting the DEAL of the century CI$5.74 minus $1.8 million is almost 4 million . I would not dare wonder who got taken care on this Deal of Century certainly not we the public.
Nice of CIG to weigh in on the “prescriptive rights to the land” issue. Perhaps they’d like to side with the owners of Britannia in their multi-million dollar fight against Dart to protect their rights too.
The headline is that the CIG continues to target a generous Chris Johnson, and not Kel Thompson. Entirely different lenses being applied on these private landowners. Not a new thing either! Make it make sense.
This is so screwed up. We complain, daily, about land being snatched up for development and construction.
Here you have a guy who probably paid peanuts for prime oceanfront land in the 1970s and instead of building on it or selling it for a fortune he wants to preserve it.
AND in their infinite wisdom, our s#!tbird government wants to seize it by compulsory purchase?!?!? AND DO WHAT WITH IT?
SMFH
This market is selling fish caught in foreign waters by Honduran fishermen, which are sold by a Jamaican.
The fish are a week to 10 days old when they are dropped off at the fish market, then they sit out on display in 90° heat all day waiting for some poor fool to come buy them. If they don’t sell they go back into the cooler to be out on display in the heat the following day.
When was the last time someone from government went down with a temperature probe to check if the fish is safe for human consumption?
Such a dangerous precedent to set. I hope that Mr. Johnson does not fold to the pressure of the government. Imagine government trying to force you to sell your land that you bought fair and square? Sure, the good intentions may be there to keep the fishermen at that spot, but at the end of the day, they are on land that does not belong to them. Mr. Johnson has every right to ask them to leave, and every right to refuse to sell to government.
Why would we need to compulsory purchase land already being used and enjoyed by fishermen, and public, at the generosity and altruism of Mr Johnson? Where is the battleground conflict in this use case?
Power, ignorance, dictatorship by air head criminals!
better looking for ulterior motives, such as cruise piers….
A very dangerous development by any Government but not surprised that this bunch of misfits did it.
Listen to KB speech. You will be frightened. Cayman deserves better.
Also listen to Turner it wasn’t me speech on the mental health facility. Got to go.
Don’t be frightened, don’t be threatened, bullies will not win in Cayman!
Reason #117 why Wayne Panton was ousted.
He refused to entertain Kenneth repeated wishes to use compulsory acquisition to purchase this spot.
Be warned Caymanians – fish market today, your land tomorrow. Once they start with the compulsory acquistion, they will come for your land next.
Kenneth just bought land next to Lobster Pot, move the fish market there. It will have better parking and less impact on traffic, and become part of the tourism establishment planned for this site.
If Government has millions to spend by property, please buy more land a modern college, UCCI and its students deserve better.
OR put that money in to the storm water management to deal with people’s houses flooding in low lying areas.
I wish the fish people would go somewhere else. That is a nice spot for swimming but is so nasty with the fish smell. Not only that, I wouldn’t risk eating that fish that sits out in the heat and no one is washing hands or tables. Gross.
It should be shut down just based on the DEH’s own food handling guidelines. Same for all the Honduran monger boats and crews in the harbour. Not a cube of ice to be found. Won’t happen though.
LOL, now we know why they are borrowing another $150M, to pay for the Civil Service COLA and a little drop left in the bucket for all the lawsuits coming their way.
Perhaps the DOE/NCC should do something about the illegal concrete the squatters have poured on the sand first?
Or is it different strokes for different folks as usual?
Let’s be clear about something, more than 90% of the fish sold there has been sitting on ice for weeks and came from Honduran fishing boats.
Has anyone ever observed a Caymanian fisherman come in there and drop off his fresh catch?
Now tell me which locals have been doing that for generations so we the people can spend our money to preserve that right.
very true, fresh my a^^
I and others have sold fish at this spot that we have caught locally since we were kids i.e. 35-40yrs.
Pish
Over the last 35-40 years I have sold 3 used cars, but that doesn’t make me a used car dealer.
We can only be thankful that you didn’t blatantly lie and say you and others “regularly sell fish there” and your catch constitutes the majority of fish sold there.
All the local fisherman perhaps? Linden, Eddie, the Ebanks Twins, the list goes on.
Definitely the fisherman twins (Adrian and Adroy Ebanks), their brother (Charles “Chalo” Ebanks) and their father (Ferris Ebanks).