If a proposed documentary chronicling Gov. Albert Bryan Jr.’s final year in office moves forward, it could begin with a familiar scene: the governor preparing for his last State of the Territory Address, collecting his notes before stepping into the Senate chambers.
From there, Government House Communications Director Richard Motta said, the film would follow the final months of the administration — not as political messaging, he emphasized Monday, but as a real-time account of how a period of crisis and recovery unfolded. Whether the documentary is ever produced, however, will depend on the cost.
The Request for Proposals, issued Oct. 15 by the Property and Procurement Department and first reported on by the Virgin Islands Daily News, seeks a production company to create a feature-length documentary that interweaves behind-the-scenes footage, interviews with colleagues and family, and archival material tracing Bryan’s political rise and the defining events of his first and second terms. It calls for filming key meetings, public engagements, travel, and private reflections, along with interviews with current and former officials, community voices, and those who worked closely with the Governor through storms, the pandemic, and the territory’s long recovery.
The proposal also requires that raw footage and full-length interviews be preserved as part of the Government House archive — not just the final cut of the documentary. Motta said that distinction is central. “Those archives don’t exist now,” he said. “Retrospectives are usually made years later, based on memory. This would document events while they’re happening.”
Motta said funding for the project would come from the executive budget of the Office of the Governor, not through a new or additional appropriation. He also stressed that the administration has not committed to producing the documentary. “This is exploratory,” he said in a call with the Source Wednesday. “That’s why it’s a proposal. If the bids come back at an exorbitant amount, then we could determine it’s not worth doing.”
Even so, the possibility quickly struck a nerve within the community. In a letter circulated to senators Wednesday, one St. Croix resident objected to the use of public funds, writing that the documentary amounted to “a film about ‘himself’ using taxpayers’ money,” and adding: “If the governor wishes to make a ‘film’ about himself, let him use his own money. This has been an awful seven years for the USVI, and now he wants a ‘look at how good I did’ film? Not with our tax money.” The resident urged lawmakers to intervene to “stop this fiasco.”
Bryan, in an interview with the Source, rejected the idea that the documentary is intended as self-promotion. “It’s a straight RFP to document the term,” he said, noting that public broadcasting stations like WTJX Channel 12 have produced retrospective documentaries on previous governors. He argued that the past seven years — hurricanes, pandemic, economic instability, and efforts to stabilize the Government Employees’ Retirement System — constitute a period that deserves to be documented while firsthand perspectives are still available.
“I think history is important,” Bryan said. “There are so many landmark things that we have accomplished as an administration and as a people. Our media spends so much time detracting from what incredible people Virgin Islanders are and so little on our resilience.” Preserving this period, he said, would “chronicle an extraordinary time in our history.”
The territory, he added, was still “changing course” after two Category 5 hurricanes when it was hit with a global pandemic — a period he described as a test of the islands’ resilience. He cited efforts to stabilize the Government Employees’ Retirement System “that no one thought could be saved,” negotiate the Medicaid cap and rum cover-over agreement, implement the first comprehensive land and water use plan, reduce the local match requirement to 2 percent, and secure billions in federal funds for rebuilding.
“We started from a point where we didn’t have street signs or lights and the government was set to go broke in 30 days,” he said, adding that the administration’s approach traces back to the early 2000s and Generation Now, a nonprofit Bryan co-funded, which championed public investment and access.
“Twenty years later,” Bryan said, “we have free college education, we’re rebuilding hurricane-damaged homes at no cost to residents, and we have a program that offers $100,000 toward a first home.”
Motta echoed the sentiments, framing the project less as a tribute film than as a record of governance. “If we do this, it becomes part of the public record — owned by the government for use by people of the Virgin Islands.”
The RFP does not list an estimated project cost. Proposals are due Oct. 31, after which the administration will evaluate qualifications, approach, and pricing before deciding whether the project proceeds — or ends at the proposal stage.
