MIDDLE QUARTERS, St Elizabeth — After suffering extensive damage when it was battered by heavy rain and strong winds associated with the Category 5 Hurricane Melissa, the internationally renowned YS Falls, in this south-central parish, is finally set to resume operations.

“We are set to reopen on Saturday (today)… Everything will be open as usual. When you arrive, the tractor or the bus will take you up to the falls. The three swimming pools will be available and the waterfalls itself, so you will be able to go in, as usual,” YS Falls operator Simon Browne told the Jamaica Observer on Wednesday.

He pointed out that while the attraction’s greenery is slowly returning visitors will notice a slightly different landscape when they visit.

“It won’t be that lush look that we had before the hurricane, but it is coming back, it is greening up, so hopefully in several more months it will [look better],” said Browne as he pointed out that there will also be adjustments to the work schedule of the 46 staff members at the attraction.

“Over the three months while rebuilding we used most of them to repair, clean up, rebuild, but we will be opening fully staffed, but maybe on reduced days, so instead of working five days they might work four,” added Browne.

The planned reopening of YS Falls is good news for hotelier Jason Henzell, who chairs the grass-roots, community-led organisation BREDS Treasure Beach Foundation, which has been at the forefront of the restoration work in the southern section of the parish since Hurricane Melissa struck on October 28, 2025.

“We feel extremely proud of the progress that has been made, although we are not where we want to be yet,” Henzell told the Observer.

He pointed out that millions of dollars has been pumped into helping small businesses restoration efforts across St Elizabeth’s southern belt.

“Through BREDS we were able to give more than 20 business grants to various attractions at different levels and it is really encouraging to see persons putting their businesses back together,” added Henzell, who noted that YS Falls was not one of the recipients.

According to Henzell, the restoration of attractions and local businesses is gradually happening.

“Captain Dennis, with his beach lunch and boat tour, opened up already. We see YS Falls opening up on January 24. And Pelican Bar — which is an important attraction on the south coast…will be there on the 31st of January.

“We have secured some sponsorship from Red Stripe to assist. I really want to make note that Spectrum Roofing was also a big supporter of Pelican Bar by providing some discounting and some credit for him to get back roofing material and building material,” added Henzell.

He told the Observer that more attractions, including Appleton Estate Rum Tour in northern St Elizabeth, are likely to be reopened by February.

“It is very encouraging to see small restaurants like Lobster Pot reopening in Great Bay… Captain Joseph — who also does a beach cook-out — he is opening back, and various others like Wassy Jerk. We [BREDS Foundation] did small, medium and large grants depending on the size of the business ranging from $150,000 to $580,000. Rudy’s Jungle Bar in Black River, I know that he is rebuilding too,” said Henzell.

The hotelier pointed out that 300 tourism workers in Treasure Beach received grants and more than 400 farmers also benefited from vouchers through BREDS.

“Because we know that they were without employment for several months, so we were able to give a growing number of grants to those 300 workers. We are seeing the fishermen build back their traps and going back to sea. We see a lot of farmers [benefiting] through the farming voucher programme. We continue to seek sponsors to expand the farming voucher programme, because we are probably about 40-50 per cent of where we want to be with the farmers right now,” said Henzell, while crediting the NCB Foundation for activating $5.2 million worth of vouchers.

Henzell explained that the foundation, which has already distributed some $55 to $60 million in cash, plus building material and vouchers, is now into the next phase of its post-Melissa recovery.

“We are basically focusing on giving people vouchers to assist with homes that were damaged to various degrees… so we are seeing quite a lot of activity in the building material which is phase three of our recovery.

“There is a donor who is providing two containers of zinc, but that is more going to the Parottee and Black River area. We have been assisting various churches that had donations but were not registered. These are relationships where there is enough trust that we facilitated them bringing it through BREDS,” Henzell added as he lauded entities which have partnered with the foundation including Creators of Hope, a non-profit organisation dedicated to serving the people and families who are most overlooked.

“They built a home for someone in Parottee last week. This is an improvement on the Food For the Poor structure and it is an affordable housing unit that was designed by one of our directors, Dennis Abrahams. It uses concrete columns, making the structure much stronger. It is the third structure built using this design; it is something that we want to see expanded,” said Henzell.

One of three pools at the YS Falls attraction in northern St Elizabeth.

HENZELL… emotions are high and people are really hurting Kasey Williams