A Five-Storey Court Complex Is Planned in Front of St Lucia’s Basilica. The Archbishop Has Written to the Prime Minister

• A five-storey Halls of Justice is planned directly in front of the Minor Basilica in Castries
• The Archbishop wrote privately to the Prime Minister about its size and proximity
• The opposition leader warned the church could be damaged during construction
• The government says city space is scarce but it is discussing a buffer

Saint Lucia’s Catholic Church has raised concerns about a major government building project planned for the doorstep of its most important place of worship in the capital. The St Lucia Times reported in October 2024 that the Halls of Justice, a new court complex, is set to rise directly in front of the Minor Basilica of the Immaculate Conception on Micoud Street in downtown Castries.

According to a church official quoted in the report, the Archbishop put the church’s objections in writing. “The Archbishop has written to the Prime Minister… expressing our concerns of not just the proximity, but the size,” the official said. The project is being delivered under a Build Own Lease Transfer arrangement with a company named Themis LTD, and is planned as a five-storey building with 14 courtrooms, six magistrates’ chambers and nine judges’ chambers, along with supporting facilities.

Opposition leader Allen Chastanet of the United Workers Party took up the issue, comparing the building’s bulk to Orange Grove Plaza with an extra floor added. “We’re going to wait for them to pile, and for the damage to be done to our church?” he asked, pointing to the risk that foundation work next to a historic structure could harm it.

Prime Minister Philip J. Pierre did not dismiss the concern but defended the need to build in the city centre. “City space is a valuable space right now. What we’ve done is we are in discussions to see if we can create enough buffer,” he said, indicating that the government was looking at how much separation could be created between the new complex and the basilica.

The dispute captures a tension that plays out wherever old church buildings sit in the middle of growing towns: congregations own landmark property in prime locations, but they rarely control what happens on the plots around them. A church can hold clear title to its land and still find its setting, its structure and even its future maintenance costs shaped by a neighbouring development it has little power to stop.

For Jamaica, the lesson is close to home. Many of the island’s oldest parish churches and chapels stand in crowded town centres such as Kingston, Spanish Town, Montego Bay and Falmouth, where government offices, commercial plazas and road works are pressing in. Church trustees and property committees would do well to know exactly where their boundaries lie, keep condition surveys of historic buildings up to date, and engage early with planning authorities when major projects are proposed nearby, so that concerns about vibration, piling and scale are on record before construction begins rather than after damage is done.

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