As Leveler, Hurricane Hit More Than Buildings : In Virgin Islands, Rich and Poor Get Chance to Rebuild on More Equal Terms

Police Capt. Jerry Swan, standing on the docks of Gallows Bay on the formerly beautiful island of St. Croix, gazed toward Recovery Hill, once lush and green, now browned by Hurricane Hugo, dotted with homes missing walls and roofs.

“See that house up there?” he said, pointing to a huge, once-opulent structure on the summit. “Now it’s on the same level as that guy’s down there,” pointing to a far more modest home down the slope. Both had suffered extensive damage, both were uninhabitable.

Hugo, the great leveler, has in many ways put rich and poor, white and black, on an equal footing here, a U.S. territory where the gap before the storm was enormous.

As bad as the ruin is--as many as three-quarters of the structures on the island were destroyed or heavily damaged last week--some now see a hope for equality that did not exist before.

“Sometimes in a disaster is an opportunity to rebuild, to correct mistakes,” said Swan. “Outsiders” control much of the islands’ wealth, he said, meaning whites. “This may be an opportunity--with Uncle Sam’s money coming in--to make sure that the local man gets what he deserves.”

“God, sent this hurricane to us so we could get together,” said Lawrence Neilsen, as he cautiously drove a pickup truck through the ruins.

But Hugo also guaranteed that the prevalent elements of any new equality on the U.S. Virgin Islands would be deprivation and economic struggle.

Prior to the storm, tourism generated roughly half of the $1.2 billion gross territorial product on these Caribbean islands, much of it from cruise ships. In the wake of reports of horrendous damage and widespread looting on St. Croix, that revenue is now in jeopardy.

Amid the telephone poles swept to a 45-degree angle here, the stench of rotting garbage and decaying flesh of animals killed by flying debris fills the air. Stores that used to sell diamonds and fancy perfumes are now only empty shells.

The Virgin Islands, composed of three large islands--St. Croix, which was damaged most severely; St. Thomas, and St. John--and dozens of smaller islands, have long been vacation spots where affluent whites have spent leisure hours alongside an increasingly restive native population.

Over 70% of the 106,000 population is black. A third of the inhabitants lives below the poverty line. For the most part, the shopping, sunning and swimming spots belong to whites, while the cheap labor and unemployment statistics are dominated by blacks.

Whatever the islands do with their recovery, race will stand as a formidable obstacle.

Many black people had complained even before Hurricane Hugo they they were left out of the island’s good life, and such feelings have intensified since the storm.

“It’s getting racial here,’ said Melanie Castor, a restaurant waitress who is black. “The whole thing came up because of rumors that black people had guns to kill all white people.”

Many whites recoiled in fear at the sight of the looting, which occured as soon as the storm’s winds diminished, and the inability of police to stop it. Many vividly recalled the 1972 slaying of eight people, seven of them white. They were gunned down during a foiled robbery attempt at the luxurious Fountain Valley Golf Club on St. Croix, an incident that came to symbolize the tension and economic gap between whites and blacks here.

The looting on St. Croix “seemed like Fountain Valley all over again,” said Eric Dane, a white man who said he is leaving St. Croix partly because of racial tension.

The situation is not particularly appealing to other white islanders as well. Tom Kolacia, food and beverage manager for the Gallows Bay Crab and Oyster House, said blacks “claim they own the island and we come in and take it over. Then, Hugo.”

Many black people here claim looters took food because they were hungry and that, moreover, store owners gave away food and appliances but could not admit that to insurers because that would prevent reimbursement for losses.

Symbols of Neglect

While many blacks and whites are grateful that the troops dispatched here have restored order, the soldiers are also seen as symbols of U.S. neglect. Many people complained that while troops carrying guns are highly visible, none can be seen carrying construction tools or communications equipment. Relief supplies trailed the arrival of military police by days. A 6 p.m. to 6 a.m. curfew remains in effect.

Ray Sewer, an accountant whose property looked like it had been hit by a defoliant, complained that U.S. officials traditionally have said of islanders: “Oh, they’re just down there under the coconut trees.”

In an effort to seize federal attention while the storm’s aftermath is still in the news, Virgin Islands officials conduct nightly strategy sessions on St. Thomas, 37 miles north of here. On Monday night Gov. Alexander Farrelly said that an economic recovery plan “is already being drafted, and we are reaching out on the mainland to counter the negative publicity caused by the hurricane and its aftermath.”

Officials here said federal emergency aid will be made available, including $10,000 grants and low-interest loans, but islanders still were complaining about the slowness in getting basic assistance.

As for long-term assistance, officials in Washington at the Interior Department, which oversees administration of the islands, said that Secretary Manuel Lujan Jr. was sending a letter to President Bush recommending creation of two task forces to formulate environmental policy and policies on economic recovery.

Some islanders hope that they can be weaned from a dependence on tourism, with its overtones of blacks serving whites. “Tourism is easy money,” said Wycherley Gumbs, superintendent of the Methodist Church for the Leeward Islands. “But a sense of mobility does not lead to stability.’

Puerto Rico Example

Gumbs would like to see the Virgin Islands model themselves after Puerto Rico in building small manufacturing industries.

But any dramatic move away from tourism as the premier island industry “would be a Herculean leap forward,” said Robert G. Sturgill, the Interior Department’s international affairs director.

In any case, Clystene Wilson, a spokesman for the governor, said that “we’re going to rebuild and be better than ever.’

Elois O’Neal, a junior high school teacher who had come to the American Legion shelter on St. Croix for food, agreed. The massive storm was “sent to get us straightened out,” she said, asserting that when she moved here from Philadelphia 20 years ago, “people treated people like people.”

Harold Willocks, a public defender, predicted that “we will be closer because we all have shared a common disaster.”