The Tribune

A key opponent of the $200m Rosewood Exuma resort yesterday asserted it fears its own high-end business will be damaged if its competitor is allowed to locate a service dock “less than one fotball field” aware from its property.

Michael DeAcetis, director of investment operations for Over Yonder Cay, and vice-president of Yonder Holdings Ltd, told the Subdivision and Development Appeal Board (SDAB) that Rosewood Exuma’s configuration could damage the secluded experience his property offers to its high-end guests.

“We're very concerned about it hurting our business,” he said during testimony at a hearing where Yonder Holdings and Turtlegrass Resort & Island Club are challenging, and seeking to overturn, the preliminary site plan approval granted to Yntegra, the Miami-based developer, by the Town Planning Committee.

Mr DeAcetis said his property features a 72-acre island of four guest villas, a staff village, a beach club and a nine-hole golf course built around the shoreline to maximise ocean views. He testified that supply and staff vessels routed through the North Bay channel to service the Rosewood Exuma development would pass “less than one football field” from Over Yonder's beaches and in view of several guest villas, including East Cove.

“People don't come to the Exumas for the casinos or the shopping,” Mr DeAcetis said. “They come for the beauty of the water.” He added that guests snorkel and scuba dive directly off the beach in the adjacent North Cut.

“They come expecting paradise, and so we have to do our best to meet that,” he added, “on the view, on the condition of everything on the island.” Increased vessel traffic, Mr DeAcetis warned, would disturb that experience and disrupt day-to-day operations that rely on frequent small boats for supplies ranging from spare food to emergency medication.

Mr DeAcetis testified that Over Yonder relies on smaller vessels, 70 to 110 feet in length, to deliver fuel by ISO tank, and alleged that larger fuel barges of the kind proposed to service Rosewood Exuma cannot safely navigate the area's tides, winds and narrow channels. “It's too dangerous. It just doesn't work,” he said. 

The resort, which employs 24 full-time staff, 22 of them Bahamian, has won multiple World Travel Awards, including Best Caribbean Island, Best American Island and Best Boutique Villa, and is nominated for Best Private Caribbean Island in 2026.

Mr DeAcetis said guests typically charter the island for a minimum of four nights, often a week and sometimes as long as a month, in visits that support local hiring, local fishermen and vendors, and significant VAT payments. Increased noise and vessel traffic, he said, “is going to diminish their experience and could mean that we'll lose business, because it won't be the best experience that they were expecting”.

Mr DeAcetis argued an alternative would be to relocate Rosewood Exuma’s supply dock through one of two existing marinas on the south side of Sampson Cay.

Under cross-examination, Mr DeAcetis acknowledged that Over Yonder had itself dredged a small basin on its own property to create a loading area, and confirmed the resort disposes of sewage through septic systems and garbage by barge to Nassau.