Guess the devil will be in the details on where the funds to purchase 15 parcels of land encompassing 564 acres will come from, and who will get what for it. The only named participants, “Concord Eastridge, a national player in putting together public-private partnerships [and] one of the company's affiliates, Stonewall Heights, LLC,” don't sound to me like “a non-profit solution” for Harpers Ferry. The concept expressed by Civil War Preservation Trust President Jim Lighthizer that you quote, "preservation and development are not mutually exclusive,” is valid. This was similarly expressed with regard to Fort Hancock by former Sandy Hook Superintendent Russel Wilson.

The core of Fort Hancock is approximately 140 acres of the 1,665 acres of Sandy Hook parklands otherwise protected as a natural and recreational environment. With more than 100 buildings, this area has been identified for adaptive reuse since the National Park Service first began administering Sandy Hook in the mid-1970s.
The concept of creating a "Gateway Village" for adaptive reuse was formalized in the 1979 General Management Plan for Gateway National Recreation Area. The 1990 General Management Plan Amendment for the Sandy Hook unit reaffirmed the adaptive reuse plan and identified a partnership between the National Park Service and private entities as the way to make it happen. Both planning efforts were the subject of extensive public review and comment.
The goal has always been to assure the long-term preservation of these historic military buildings by adapting them for a variety of compatible uses. The James J. Howard Marine Laboratory, Brookdale Community College Oceanographic Institute, the N.J. Marine Sciences Consortium and the Marine Academy of Science and Technology have been our partners in adaptive reuse for more than 20 years. This winter, the N.J. Audubon Society joins us following its rehabilitation of the historic hospital steward’s quarters as the Sandy Hook Bird Observatory.
We began an effort to further the adaptive reuse of Fort Hancock’s buildings through the National Park Service’s historic leasing authority in 1998. This authority allows for the leasing of excess historic properties in national parks for compatible uses to both public and private groups. http://honors.njit.edu/news/colloquium/previewf03/sandyhook.htm

I have followed this process for nearly 30 years. The present plan appears to be the best that can be accomplished. Fort Hancock covers less than 10% of Sandy Hook’s acreage. Of the more than 100 buildings within Fort Hancock, approximately 1/3 are used by the NPS, 1/3 by public “partners” as described above, and the remaining 1/3 subject to the proposed plan. Of that 1/3, 30% is required by the agreement to be used for educational purposes. This leaves about 22% of the buildings [let’s say 3% of Sandy hook] to be used for “commercial” purposes, many of which will support the existing NPS and public partners’ uses. With no new construction, and all rehabilitation conducted under the Department of the Interior’s Standards for Rehabilitation and Reuse [and the even stricter ones of the NJ State Historic Preservation Office], this is a small price to pay for such an important cultural and historic resource.

It’s easy to criticize from a distance when you haven’t watched these buildings deteriorate more and more each year. From my up-close observation, I believe that public demand is just about satiated by the 60+ buildings in current use by the NPS and non-profit partners. I can’t agree with “principles” that would allow the remaining 36 buildings to fall down, or people who can’t suggest a viable alternative. What sort of non-profit solution would you propose for these 36? Should we take another 30 years to come up with one?