Harbour Road residents continue to be outraged by the ?Kafka-esque denial of due process? in the Newstead development.

Residents cried foul when Environment Minister Neletha Butterfield awarded a Special Development Order (SDO) to expedite the planning process for the development two weeks ago, saying they felt denied their chance to hold a public hearing on the matter.

The usual application process ?was circumvented to a degree by the fact that the SDO was given,? Planning director Rudolph Hollis said.

Newstead area residents complained a public hearing was never held into the application, despite the number of objections lodged. Residents have maintained they are not against development of the site, but have serious concerns about the extent of the development and the environmental impact it may have on the area.

Several have spent thousands of dollars on architects to examine the plans and lodge their complaints against the density of the development on the four-acre site.

However Mr. Hollis said there is no set number of objectors necessary for a hearing to be held, adding the number will be at the discretion of the Board depending on the scale of each particular development and its significance.

A hearing, he added, is usually held if the Board is going to recommend approving the plans but there are objections to them. Were the Board to reject an application, a hearing becomes redundant because the Board, to some extent, is agreeing with the objectors.

In this case, a decision had not yet been made on whether or not to hold a hearing when the matter was taken out of the Board?s hands by the Minister, Mr. Hollis said.

The Board had also not yet decided whether or not to conduct analyses into the impact of the development on the environment or traffic surveys when the SDO was awarded on the advice of the permanent secretary, Mr. Hollis said.

Environment permanent secretary Brian Rowlinson said Harbour Road is one of the three main thoroughfares on the Island and should be able to handle traffic, although he said that was a decision Planning would have taken. ?The site did not warrant a fully fledged analysis,? he said.

The SDO was authorised because part of the development encroached onto green space, and there was a question mark as to whether or not the Board had the authority to approve tourism development there.

Mr. Hollis declined to comment on rumours Board members were angered at the awarding of the SDO.

Tourism Minister Renee Webb was able to comment on rumours that she has a conflict of interest in the Newstead development, however.

Ms Webb is a director and part owner of Maximum Financial, a company located at 37 Harbour Road on the Newstead property.

Pointing out that former Tourism Minister David Dodwell owned and operated the Reefs hotel while he was Tourism Minister, Ms Webb said it was ?stretching it? to suggest there was a conflict of interest between her role at Maximum Financial and the Newstead development.

?This is just one of many companies that I am a director of,? she said. ?I am only concerned with the tourism aspect of the development at Newstead.?

Saying she had been unaware Maximum Financial was actually on the Newstead property, she said the land it was on was zoned for commercial use and was not a part of the Newstead development. The SDO also changes the zoning of that land from residential to ?Class 2? office.

Maximum has been at that location for about a year, chairman and COO Paul Comesky said. They rented the property from the prior Newstead owners Tony and Dana Goodfellow, as did the tenants before them, Aquila Capital Management Ltd.

Mr. Comesky said that, as a director of the company, Ms Webb has no financial gain from Maximum unless she brings in business herself ? similar to working on a commission as opposed to a salary.

However, although Maximum is involved in several significant venture capital projects, Mr. Comesky said Ms Webb has not been a part of that yet, and has not made any financial gain from her involvement in the company.

?As a director she sits on the Board ... She helps, with her knowledge and experience, with company decisions,? he said.

Developer Kevin Petty said the application process was begun in the Belmont/Newstead development about 18 months ago, before Maximum Financial appeared on the Newstead property.

As for Tourism?s part in that process, Ms Webb said her Ministry has approved in principle what the developers want to do with the site, and said she was excited about it.

Government has placed a high priority on increasing the number of tourism beds on the Island, she said, and developments such as Newstead, along with the changes at the former Sonesta Beach Hotel and moves to regenerate the old Club Med site ? developments that have not been seen in Bermuda in decades ? are welcome.

Mr. Petty said he has hired former Newstead general manager Bushara Bushara to manage not only the redeveloped Newstead, but Belmont and the Belmont Hills Golf Course as well.

Mr. Bushara, who will manage the Golf Course until the hotels are up and running, said the team running the hotels will be ?a local team with a local focus?, not an overseas hotel management company such as the company which will take over the old Sonesta Beach, Wyndham Resorts.

He also said that, despite area residents? fears to the contrary, ?Newstead will be a hotel by any definition.?

It will not be a traditional hotel, however. Newstead will be a fractional and a hotel product, similar to the development at Tucker?s Point, the difference being that at Tucker?s Point the fractionals are separate from the hotel whereas at Newstead they will be one and the same.

That means it is similar to a high-end time-share, Mr. Bushara explained, and travellers are actually deeded their units for a length of time such as eight weeks.

The 104 rooms at Newstead will be laid out in two- and three-bedroom suites which can be deeded whole as fractionals or rented room by room as hotel rooms.

The development is designed by architect Ted Wood of Entassis Architecture, who also designed the XL Capital building. ?We are trying very hard to keep the old charm of Newstead with all the modern amenities of a high-end hotel,? Mr. Bushara said.