NATIONAL ENVIRONMENT and Planning Agency (NEPA), hailed last Tuesday's guilty verdict levied against the Half Moon Bay Limited as a "victory for the environment."
Half Moon Bay Limited, responsible for the upscale Half Moon Hotel, was found guilty of breaching the Beach Control Act in the Montego Bay Resident Magistrate's Court last Tuesday.
According to NEPA, the company had been charged on two counts, including digging and dredging sand from the foreshore and the floor of the sea and also dumping of large and small boulders on the foreshore and floor of the sea.
On one count, Resident Magistrate Paulette Williams handed down a six-month prison sentence, suspended for one year to Financial Controller, Peter Kellond, who appeared on behalf of the Half Moon. On the other, the company was admonished.
NEPA had first taken Half Moon Bay Limited to court on January 17, 2002 based on an investigation by officers of the Agency. A visit to the Half Moon Golf, Tennis and Beach Club in Rose Hall St. James on Friday December 14, 2001, by NEPA officers discovered that coastal modifications were taking place.
A release from NEPA explained that while Half Moon Bay Limited "does have a Beach Licence for the use of the beach in connection with the operation of the Half Moon Golf, Tennis and Beach Club, it does not have a Beach Licence to construct any new structures on the foreshore and floor of the sea in that location."
The matter was to have been brought back to the RM Court on March 28, 2002 but had been moved up by more than a month.
NEPA's Manager for Public Education and Outreach, Rosemarie Chung, had explained earlier this week that the court date had been brought forward from March 28, 2002 because "we heard that work was continuing but they said that all they were doing was removing boulders and they also have an application for a beach licence and we have said that we are not considering until the court matter is settled." NEPA later received an application from Half Moon Bay Limited in the first week of December 2001 after they had already commenced foreshore works.
The application, reportedly sent in after work had begun, relates to a proposal for constructing coastal structures to create enclosures in the sea, to be used in conjunction with a dolphin attraction.
In a release yesterday, NEPA said that the NRCA has jurisdiction under the Beach Control Act to grant licences for the use of the foreshore and the floor of the sea in connection with any commercial use of, or encroachment on the foreshore and floor of the sea.
It is an offence under the Act to carry out such modification or construction without a Beach Licence.
NEPA said that under section 5(3) of the Beach Control Act where a company is guilty of a contravention under section 5 every director, manager, agent or officer of the company who is knowingly a party to the contravention, is liable to the penalty prescribed by the subsection which is a maximum of 12 months imprisonment or $20 for each day the contravention continues.
The Beach Control Act is now being amended to reflect more realistic fines and additional penalty options, in keeping with the need to protect and conserve Jamaica's coastal zone resources.
