A battle continues over the state of Grace Island.

Bermuda businessman Mr. Fernance Perry has again applied to the Planning Department to develop a religious retreat on the 5.9-acre Great Sound island.

But the National Trust and residents at nearby Burgess Point in Warwick want it left as it is.

In a letter sent to the Director of Planning last week, Mr. Campbell McBeath of Burgess Point Road said the latest proposal "would completely change the character of one of the last undeveloped islands in the Great Sound''.

The Development Applications Board is expected to decide the issue, but a date for a hearing has not been set.

Plans include a 1,800-square-foot mess hall, a 900-square-foot janitor's cottage, a new dock, and paved golf cart tracks.

Mr. Perry, who counts chairmanship of the Bermuda Broadcasting Company among his business interests, is a member of the Evangelical Church and wants to develop a Christian camping retreat run by a non-profit trust on the island, which he owns.

His original plan for a retreat that could accommodate up to 140 campers was turned down by the DAB in 1992, and his appeal was dismissed.

But when his agent Mr. Douglas Backeberg appeared before the tribunal hearing objections to the draft Bermuda Plan 1992, he said plans had changed and it was expected most visits would involve only 20 to 30 people. And only one percent of the site would be covered by the development.

Under the old Bermuda Plan, the island was zoned nature reserve. But the tribunal agreed to change part of the zoning to open space and green space, "which would give the DAB discretion to consider the proposal,'' said Mr. Tim Marshall, the Trust's environmental chairman.

"The Trust is definitely opposed to development on such a sensitive island.'' Mr. Perry wanted to keep most of the island as a nature reserve, restore native woodland, and build on a small, secluded central area, Mr. Backeberg said.

There is an existing dock and a 500-square-foot "dilapidated cottage'' on the island. Mr. Backeberg said no decision had been made on whether it would be demolished.

But Mr. McBeath said the latest application from Mr. Perry only involved a "relatively minor'' change, pivoting the mess hall on its axis.

Large trees would still have to be removed from the centre of the island, and the 30-foot-wide dock would spoil the view of the island.

"In view of Bermuda's changed circumstances with the imminent return of military lands...to the Government, one must question the real need for this project,'' he said.

Mr. Backeberg, of Marshall Bernardo Partnership, said casuarina trees were threatening natural plants, a squatter had moved onto the island, and litterers were "messing it up''.

"Grace Island is presently uninhabited and therefore attracts vandals and undesirables who cannot go elsewhere,'' Mr. Backeberg said in a letter to Planning. "Leaving the island as it is brings about the very problems the objectors claim will occur in a controlled development.'' In another letter to Planning, Mr. Alec Fowles and his wife Barbara, who live about 800 yards from the island at Burgess Point, also expressed their opposition.

"The Planning Department has been flooded with applications from Mr. and Mrs.

Perry for about the last three years, and it amazes us that the applicants still continue with their deliberate attempts to flout the Planning laws to the detriment of Bermuda,'' the letter said.

Mr. Marshall, a lawyer, said the island is such a sensitive area that the owner should lose any development rights he might have once had.

"That brings up the whole question of whether Government is going to consider compensation for individuals like Mr. Perry,'' he said. "Many members of the Trust are sympathetic to some sort of compensation scheme.''