New financing for the resort development at Morgan’s Point is “close to happening”, a Bermuda Government minister said yesterday.

Walton Brown, Minister for the Cabinet Office, said there were plans in the works to realise the financing for the project, the progress of which has slowed down due to a financing shortfall.

Mr Brown said: “I think it’s close to happening.”

A spokesman for the developer declined comment yesterday.

Work on the hotel construction phase of the project was halted on March 27, 2018, with workers told that morning that work was to be suspended by the end of the day. Some 150 construction staff were affected, many of them skilled tradespeople. Construction on the project’s residential units was to continue on a limited basis.

At the time, a spokesman for George’s Bay Ltd, an arm of Morgan’s Point Ltd, said: “First-phase construction activity at Caroline Bay has been reduced ... due to construction costs outpacing the existing financing of the project.”

Having given a $165 million loan guarantee in relation to the project, Government said last March that it was in discussions with the project’s developers regarding their need for more financing.

Also last March, Craig Christensen and Nelson Hunt resigned from the board of George’s Bay Ltd, to be replaced by Andy Burrows, then chief investment officer of the Bermuda Tourism Authority, and Nancy Duperreault, wife of board chairman Brian Duperreault. Mr Burrows is now chief executive officer of the Bermuda Business Development Agency.

Premier David Burt, at the time also Minister of Finance, said Mr Burrows’s appointment would “ensure the Government’s interests are safeguarded during this critical phase”.

The first phase of the development, branded as Caroline Bay, includes 35 Ritz-Carlton Reserve residential units and a 79-room Ritz-Carlton Reserve hotel.