Congratulations to the community for standing up for their rights and successfully revoking the Prosperity Farm building permits! Prosperity Farm/Raising Cane/H+L Distillery filed a reduction in scope of the distillation equipment down to a juicing machine today, just prior to the BLUA hearing, which resulted in the cancellation of the existing permits.
There is no need to join the BLUA Hearing today.
While at the moment, this is a great WIN for the community, there are still major concerns with the exisiting and future plans of The Farm. Our health and environment are still at risk.
Next Steps:
- Support Senator Whitaker’s bill to repeal the amendment so that no distilleries are allowed on ANY Virgin Islands agricultural lands.
- DPNR needs to hold Prosperity Farm, H+L Distillery, and Raising Cane responsible for their egregious environmental practices and non-compliance issues.
- Support sustainable development! The Farm needs to be transparent and accountable with the following:
-Stormwater permit (SWIP)
-Soil conservation plan from USDA/NRDC
-TPDES permit
-Well appropriation permit and logs
-Flood plan permit
-Certified pesticide operator permits and logs
-CZM approval of the permits that this development; the buildings, process, and waste do not infringe into CZM areas
-Require that the wetlands be rebuilt
Important Note: Mr. Apfel mentions his plans to install a juicer for the cane. There is a short shelf-life for the cane juice, only a day or so, before it spoils. This means the juice will have to be processed and bottled immediately. This can be done by pasteurization, adding preservatives, or possibly other methods. It is imperative that we keep a close eye on the new plans because one tactic could be to build a plant to cook the cane juice down into molasses which creates another layer of environmental problems. This would go along with The Farm’s plans to make money by trying to create a usable molasses product to sell to Diageo or Cruzan Rum.