Georgia taxpayers have poured $75 million into updating Jekyll Island’s aging amenities in hopes that a tourism turnaround will reverse years of declining tourism. Now the state park’s administrators hope that an uptick in visitors and a flashy new convention center and retail district can justify the expense.
Gov. Nathan Deal visited the beachside park on Monday for what he billed as a “rededication” ceremony to celebrate the sprawling new convention center, cluster of retails shops and restaurants, and 200-room hotel. In all, the makeover cost nearly $200 million, with most of the money coming from private partners.
It’s a decade-long gamble for Georgia officials, who began to consider an overhaul of the island’s dilapidated hotels and crusty convention center in the early 2000s. But a controversial proposal for a luxury development by the owners of the Reynolds Plantation tanked with the economy, and other plans stalled as well.
The Jekyll Island Authority, with about $75 million in state-backed financing, picked up where they left off. The authority redid the island entryway, remade the public beach and underwrote the $36 million convention center, which overlooks the beach.
The Westin secured financing for a new hotel, and Holiday Inn remodeled an aging hotel into a new oceanfront resort. A new Jekyll Island Youth and Learning Center to replace a faded 4-H center is in the works with the help of $16 million in tax dollars.
Jones Hooks, the authority’s executive director, said the redevelopment means that “Jekyll Island is once again a very bright spot on Georgia’s coast.”
Traffic to Jekyll has yet to match the island’s peak year of 1990, when more than 1 million vehicles were counted. But the number of cars and buses has jumped about a quarter from 2012, when the convention center opened, until last year. And convention and meeting bookings have spiked from 131 to 216 over the past three years.
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