Eco Hvar

A Plea for Peace on Hvar's Islets

Published in Highlights
There has been an uneasy, sometimes hostile relationship between Hvar Town's party organizers and other tourist organizations in the town and on the outlying Pakleni islands.
Peaceful moonlight over Hvar Cathedral Peaceful moonlight over Hvar Cathedral Photo Vivian Grisogono
There are perfectly adequate laws regulating public order, which should be sufficient to allow partying to coexist with family tourism, but there is a problem with enforcement. When Hvar mayor Rino Budrović took up his post in 2013, he promised to ensure that the laws would be obeyed. Katija Zaninović Dawnay's party, 'Lista za ponos mista' had unexpected success in the 2013 local elections, with the resolve to curb all-night noise and drunken disorder as a main subject in their agenda. Members of the party were prime movers in organizing a petition in August 2011, delivered to then-Mayor Pjerino Bebić with an impressive 550 signatures attached. Their Council members have achieved much in their short time in office, but the party dilemma remains unresolved.

Now a new petition has been launched, this time emanating from concerned residents, hospitality providers and guests on Hvar's Pakleni Islands. Dated July 6th 2014, it has been delivered to Mayor Rino Budrović, backed by another impressive list of signatures.

The petition reads as follows:

"Hvar Town Mayor

Mr. RINO BUDROVIĆ

Copy to:

Marko Jeličić, President of The City Council

Members of the Hvar Town City Council

Public Institute for the Management of Protected Natural Values – territory of Split-Dalmatia County

Director : Mr. Ivan Gabelica 

Ministry of Tourism, Republic of Croatia

Cabinet of the Minister
Mr. Ivan Glušac, Cabinet secretary

Adriatic Croatia International Club – ACI Marina, Opatija - Mrs. Doris Peručić, Deputy Chairman of the Board

Mr. Čikeš, Sanitary Inspectorate, Hvar Town

___________________________________________________________________________

Subject :

PETITION Letter – Group of residents and guests of St. Clement island, Palmižana

Noise and disrespect of public safety rules on Palmižana

Palmižana, 06.07.2014

Dear Sirs,

We are seeking help and protection from Town of Hvar because the situation on the island of St. Clement, Hvar archipelago, district Palmižana – Vinogradišće is completely out of control.

The whole situation escalated with the frequent presence of «Yacht Week» boats and similar uncontrolled organizations in ACI marina Palmižana whose young, mostly intoxicated guests produce unprecedented disorder and therefore threaten smooth tourist activities on Palmižana, well known for decades to be nature and environmentaly friendly. Palmižana name is widely known in the world to give peace and quiet to the guests.

After all, it has been recognized outside of Croatian borders, and numerous international media reported about our quiet and preserved tourist oasis.

According to the Law for Nature Protection of the Republic of Croatia, our islands are a protected natural heritage in the category of significant landscapes, i.e., protected landscape, which is managed by the county public institutions for management of protected natural areas. The State Parliament has declared it back in year 1972.

As it is stated in that regulation – it is not permitted to perform activities and actions that violate the features for which it was declared as protected. Therefore, we call for urgent action to protect what is legally defined as protected.

We have already witnessed last year – as soon as first boats of “Yacht Week” appear or similar uncontrolled events happen in ACI Marina Palmižana – peace and quiet on the island disappears. The first signs of devastation of the island happened last year, when too large number of young and wild people spread out over the entire island in an already intoxicated state, walking around the island with bottles of alcohol which often break and with lighted cigarettes in hand which brings a tremendous risk of fire.

We, residents of the island, clean the mess and garbage. The crowd movement from the marina to the Vinogradišće bay takes away the peace and order from private residents on Palmižana, from guests of restaurants in Vinogradišće bay, as well as from guests of worldwide known Meneghello hotel (who duly pay the tourist tax to the town of Hvar), and all of us must suffer from the loud music and whole night noise in this oasis.

Meneghello family has created from rubble and stone on the island, during past two centuries, with hard work and great love, one of Europe’s most exotic landscapes, lavish arboretum. The family has been building a reputation of island St. Clement Palmižana for over a hundred years as one of the Europe's most exotic landscapes, magnificent arboretum. The family has been building for more than one hundred years a reputation of St. Clement Palmizana as one of the largest and most beautiful Croatian, world-known brand of cultural tourism.

Palmižana (St. Clement) has been appointed in the "The Times" and "The Guardian" magazines this year, as well as the in year 2008., the most beautiful island in the Adriatic, with the attributes of an oasis of peace, beauty, art, nature and the sea. Even the Tourist Board of Hvar sends journalists from around the world to witness and write about it.

Guests are attracted by recommendation of the serious world of media, however they come and find "Sodom and Gomorrah". Neighbor restaurants share our fate and opinion, what brought our heads together in this joint intervention. The reputation of our island is seriously undermined, our longtime guests now complain about the noise and leave.

Following information from www.theyachtweek.com/croatia/, "Yacht Week" will go on during whole summer on Palmižana, every week from June 7 until August 30; the cruises are divided in two groups, the first group Monday-Wednesday, the other Wednesday-Friday, which means that their presence on the island will be five days a week! After the experience of last week, we are terribly concerned about what will happen during the summer, because the mess was worse than last year. Palmižana bay is advertised as "Natural bay" on their internet site, and invites the guests to book a fantastic journey with partying all day and night.

Families who own private houses, as well as restaurant owners of Palmižana suffer from noise daily; families with children who came to the beach to enjoy the sun and the sea are forced to leave the beach because of the vulgar and indecent behavior of these young people who are making a mess all over the island. This unbridled youth crowd passes along the paths of the island and over private property yards and gardens of Palmižana taking away the peace and integrity of Palmižana residents.

We consider it unacceptable that marina has increased the arrangement with "Yacht Week" for this summer, disrespecting the landscape around the marina and our tourist orientation that we have been building for years. By this arrogant, unilateral act, all of us residents and guests were put in a very unfavorable situation. This type of tourism is harmful and unsustainable in the long run and we will feel its consequences for years to come if the trend continues. Local inhabitants and guests feel abused by wild visitors whose only goal is to get drunk with no security guards, police or communal monitors around. We consider it to be a stepmother relationship towards one of the nicest and most profiled tourist island on the Adriatic coast.

Our short-term requirements are as follows:


1. We request to introduce the presence of communal policeman on the island.

2. We request that the ban of the drinking of alcoholic beverages in public areas, as well as the provision of the public peace and order, which expressly prohibits the sale of alcoholic beverages to intoxicated people, is monitored in the surrounding, not only in town of Hvar. 

3. We request that all guests be warned that they cannot walk freely over private property and harass residents and guests in their homes.

4. We request that warnings and fines are issued against smoking in nature and leaving cigarettes remains behind.

5. We request that guests be warned of the danger of fire.

Our long term requirements are as follows:

We request the termination of the contract with “Yacht Week” and similar arrangements on the island of St. Clement, district Palmižana - Vinogradišće.

We appeal to the town of Hvar and City Council members, elected by us as well, to intervene since we are a part of the municipality of the City of Hvar.

Residents of the island and guests sign together this petition and demand action. If no action is taken within 10 days we will seek lawyer’s advice for further action regarding protection of our substantive rights and compensation." 

Let's hope their efforts are rewarded with a return to peace and calm at the times when these should prevail. There is no doubt that solutions are available, if all involved cooperate in finding and implementing them.

© Vivian Grisogono 2014

More in this category: « Football Fever Hits Jelsa Best Guests »
back to top
You are here: Home highlights A Plea for Peace on Hvar's Islets

Eco Environment News feeds

  • Row erupts over deep-sea mining as world races to finalise vital regulations

    Head of seabed authority accused of abandoning neutrality at critical point with first commercial application imminent

    Michael Lodge, a British lawyer and the head of the UN-affiliated body responsible for governing mining in the high seas, has been criticised by diplomats who claim he has been pushing them to accelerate the start of deep-sea mining.

    A German diplomat said Lodge – the secretary-general of the International Seabed Authority (ISA) – has a duty of neutrality and has overstepped his role in resisting measures put forward by some council members that could slow down approval of the first mining proposals, according to the New York Times.

    Continue reading...

  • Scientists deliver ‘final warning’ on climate crisis: act now or it’s too late

    IPCC report says only swift and drastic action can avert irrevocable damage to world

    Scientists have delivered a “final warning” on the climate crisis, as rising greenhouse gas emissions push the world to the brink of irrevocable damage that only swift and drastic action can avert.

    The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), made up of the world’s leading climate scientists, set out the final part of its mammoth sixth assessment report on Monday.

    Continue reading...

  • Country diary: The rolling hills have been planted with 280,000 trees of 15 species | Mark Cocker

    Broughton, Yorkshire:The estate isonly three years into the most transformative example of rewilding in England

    Isn’t it strange that green is the colour we most associate with nature concern. What bright green invariably means in the fields of the northern uplands, such as the Yorkshire Dales, is a place where wildlife has been almost completely purged. The point about field colour is so dramatically made at the Broughton estate you’d think it had been contrived precisely to convey this message. Here, the rolling hills, just south of the national park, have been planted with 280,000 trees of 15 species across 192 hectares (474 acres). In 2023, a further 72 hectares of the same bright green hue are earmarked for conversion to wood pasture.

    Currently, the planted areas are a forest of plastic tree-sleeves, but even in this raw state, the dominant impression is of the terrain’s underlying colour, which is a kind of matted grey-brown. Yet a tongue of the old livid-green sheepwalk intrudes into these rewilding sections and the difference couldn’t be sharper.

    Continue reading...

  • World’s biggest single eradication operation aims to remove mice from island

    Invasive house mice threaten endangered seabirds and wildlife on Marion Island in Indian Ocean

    Non-native house mice are to be removed from Marion Island in the southern Indian Ocean to protect the wandering albatross and other endangered seabirds, in the world’s largest eradication programme of its kind.

    Mice accidentally introduced on to the remote island by 19th-century seal hunters have thrived in warmer and drier conditions over the past 30 years, devastating the island’s invertebrates and plants, and then devouring the chicks and even adults of ground- and burrow-nesting seabirds.

    Continue reading...

  • Campaigners fear loophole will let new homes in England be fitted with gas boilers

    Regulation may allow ‘hydrogen-ready’ boilers that can run on fossil fuel gas, and are unlikely ever to use hydrogen

    Ministers are preparing to allow new houses to continue to be fitted with gas boilers, long after they were supposed to be phased out, campaigners fear.

    A loophole being considered for the forthcoming future homes standard, a housing regulation in England intended to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from newly built homes in line with the net zero target, would allow new homes to be fitted with “hydrogen-ready” boilers.

    Continue reading...

  • First birds, now mammals: how H5N1 is killing thousands of sea lions in Peru

    Avian flu has decimated the marine creatures on the country’s Pacific coastline and scientists fear it could be jumping from mammal to mammal

    At first, it appears to be dead. Its head lies in the sand, and a small tide pool has formed around it. Its shoulder blades jut out and its coffee and beige pelt hangs loosely on protruding vertebrae that taper down to its long tail flippers.

    But the young male sea lion is still alive. Its round wet eyes blink and occasionally it tries to move, rolling over or lifting its head, as the flooding tide inches it up the beach in Chepeconde, about 75 miles south of Peru’s coastal capital, Lima.

    Continue reading...

  • ‘Like a Roman hoard’: calls grow for return of Hampshire shark’s body parts

    Historian Dan Snow assembled team to ‘secure the shark for science’ but head, tail and fin were gone

    The discovery of a rare shark on a Hampshire beach is as valuable as the unearthing of an ancient treasure trove, an expert has said, as calls grow for the return of the head, tail and fin, which were removed before scientists could salvage the carcass.

    The 2-metre (6ft) animal, believed to be a smalltooth sand tiger shark, would normally only be seen in warmer waters – and rarely anywhere north of the Bay of Biscay. Scientists believe the weekend discovery can help them learn more about how the species develops and lives its life.

    Continue reading...

  • Watchdog to block shareholder payouts if UK water companies miss targets

    Ofwat says new powers will be used if firms fail to reach performance and environmental goals

    The UK water regulator is to use new powers to block companies from shareholder payouts if they fail to hit performance and environmental targets.

    Ofwat, which in December heavily criticised some of the country’s biggest suppliers over the size of dividend payments relative to their financial performance, said the new rules would also mean water companies would “maintain a higher level of overall financial health”.

    Continue reading...

  • Australia must do more to prevent ‘looting and destruction’ of underwater heritage, report says

    Government urged to ratify UN convention in order to protect undersea areas like shipwrecks and now-submerged First Nations heritage sites

    The underwater world – from shipwrecks with human remains inside to First Nations sites that are tens of thousands of years old – needs better protection, a parliamentary committee has found.

    Pirates have targeted second world war shipwrecks for scrap metal, looters have been trophy hunting in sunken boats and the bodies of drowned sailors have been disturbed in the process. Technological advancements mean Australia’s underwater cultural heritage is more vulnerable than ever, the committee heard.

    Sign up for Guardian Australia’s free morning and afternoonemail newsletters for your daily news roundup

    Continue reading...

  • A ladybird: how is it possible to love something so small so much? | Helen Sullivan

    Ladybirds know how good they look, and they don’t keep it to themselves

    The ladybird gets the first part of its name from Our Lady, TheLady, Mary. Its spots – seven, if you are in Europe – symbolise Mary’s seven sorrows, its red shell the cloak she wears sometimes, when she is feeling passionate or loving, or devoted to her son, or, when she’s in a particularly generous mood, devoted to all of humanity.

    Ladybirds come from the coccinellid family of beetles, the name for which comes from the Latin for scarlet. They were given this title by Pierre André Latreille, a priest who had grown up an orphan and was thrown into a dungeon during the French Revolution and released because he recognised a rare species of beetle.

    Continue reading...

Eco Health News feeds

Eco Nature News feeds

  • Experts see hope in gloomy climate report

    Humanity is set to blow past 1.5°C of planetary warming by the early 2030s, according to a new report released today.

  • Study: Patterns of wildlife 'range loss' could offer clues for conservation

    More than one million species are at risk of extinction largely because they are being pushed out of places where they have long lived — known as “ranges.” But not all range loss looks the same.

  • Why a new treaty to protect the high seas is a ‘game-changer’

    Roughly two-thirds of the world’s oceans lie beyond national boundaries in an area known as the “high seas” — yet only about 1 percent of that largely unexplored expanse has been protected. Now, nearly 200 countries have agreed on the first-ever United Nations treaty to protect the high seas.

  • What on Earth is ‘HFLD’? (Hint: It’s about forests)

    From “blue carbon” to “ecosystem services,” environmental jargon is everywhere. Conservation International looks to make sense of it in an occasional explainer series. In this installment, we explore the role “HFLDs,” play in storing climate-warming carbon.

  • On carbon offsets, Wirecutter story doesn’t cut it

    A recent article claims that buying carbon offsets for your flight doesn't help the climate crisis. This conclusion is bafflingly wrong: Paying to protect an area of forest to offset the climate footprint of your flight does in fact — demonstrably and verifiably — help.

  • The year ahead: Climate change is here. Nature can help

    For millions of people around the world who are learning to survive in the face of droughts, floods and more frequent storms, climate change is not a future problem — it’s here now. Nature can be a powerful ally in adapting to these impacts.

  • News spotlight: A climate hero emerges — beavers

    Increasing drought and urban expansion have contributed to the destruction and degradation of 35 percent of the world’s wetlands. How might we stymie this decline? Introducing beavers back into their natural habitats is a good start.

  • 5 life lessons from women in science

    The gender gap in science is no secret. And while the number of women pursuing careers in science is steadily rising, the lack of representation can be a tough hurdle to overcome.

  • 3 reasons for hope for the Amazon

    When U.S. President Joseph Biden meets with Brazil’s newly elected president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, in Washington this week, climate change and the fate of the Amazon will be one of the many items of discussion, according to news reports.

  • The year ahead: Funding critical commitments to nature

    The recent United Nations biodiversity and climate summits ended with major commitments for stemming climate change and stopping the loss of biodiversity. As nations now turn to implementing these ambitious goals, there’s one persistent sticking point: funding.

Copyright © 2023 Eco Hvar. All Rights Reserved. Developed by Orion Informatika.