Haines Borough officials are organizing a community response to a planned reduction in ferry service that tourism director Leslie Ross describes as “winter service in the summer.”
The proposed 2016 summer schedule includes no service on Wednesdays and Saturdays, and three weekly sailings by the ferry LeConte. This compares to five weekly sailings by the Malaspina, a larger ship, in recent summers.
Under the schedule, the Malaspina will be either laid up or overhauled May 25 through September. The ferry Taku will be tied up for the entire summer, as will the fast ferries Fairweather and Chenega.
The schedule includes Monday service by the Columbia from Bellingham, Wash. and Thursday service by the Matanuska from Prince Rupert, B.C.
“No way is what they’ve proposed what we’ll need. It’s not going to be enough capacity for what our normal traffic is,” Ross said this week. “Normally, in the summer we have a ferry every day. Now traffic will be piling up to get onto a smaller boat.”
The schedule would be especially hard on local RV parks that see considerable business from “caravans” of 30 RVs or more, Ross said. “I’m not even sure that many RVs fit on the LeConte.”
If the schedule is adopted, it will impact tourism and travel by residents, in terms of getting space on board the ferry without a reservation, Ross said. “People who want to pop down to Juneau for the weekend won’t be able to do that. All around, there will be consequences.”
Kerry Town at Oceanside RV Park said the LeConte can’t accommodate larger RVs, so those vehicles would have to wait for sailings on the Columbia or Matanuska. “If there are less ferries or less larger ones here, those RVs are going to bypass Haines.”
Town said his park isn’t big enough to accommodate caravans, but the biggest percentage of RVs his park sees is either getting on or off the ferry or ones taking the ferry to Skagway to make the Golden Circle loop. “If they can’t take the ferry to Skagway, they won’t come down to Haines.”
Last-minute cuts to ferry service made the past summer “pretty much a disaster” for his park, he said.
“This is our highway. To me, this is the same as if they shut down the road to Anchorage or Fairbanks two times a week. They’re not doing that. Roads cost money. That’s just the way it is,” Town said.
Ross said the municipality is hoping to present a stack of letters and an assembly resolution in opposition to the plan to Gov. Bill Walker and the state ferry system. She said cutting service between Juneau and Haines, a profitable stretch for the system, will actually cost the state money.
State Department of Transportation spokesman Jeremy Woodrow said laying up the Malaspina, Taku, Fairweather and Chenega are for “purely financial reasons,” as DOT has been directed to expect a 12.5 percent budget reduction, identical to a reduction last year. “This is in anticipation of what funding levels we’ve been told to expect.”
Even if the Alaska Legislature approves funding above that level next spring, that wouldn’t change next summer’s schedule, which must be finalized by December to accommodate reservations and traveling schedules, Woodrow said. A new reservations system will go online at the same time.
An Alaska Marine Highway System community meeting on the schedule and the agency’s budget slated for Oct. 23 has been scratched, but may be reset, Ross said.
Resident and former borough assembly member Debra Schnabel this week suggested an entirely new approach be considered. “We need to be proactive. Letter campaigns have not proven effective in previous efforts. We need to approach this as a problem-solving exercise. If the state is tying the ships up at the dock, it might just as well lease one to us. I propose that the Haines Borough negotiate with the state to lease us a ferry to operate ourselves. We can move vehicles, people and freight,” Schnabel said. “If we believe our own arguments, the Lynn Canal run is profitable.”
The deadline for public comments on the proposed schedule is Nov. 3. Comments may be faxed to 907-228-6874 or emailed to [email protected]. Written comments should be mailed to AMHS, 7037 North Tongass Highway, Ketchikan AK 99901.
In an Oct. 6 press release, marine highway general manager John Falvey described the plan as “designed to meet the basic essential needs for community service, staying within available funding levels and maintaining regulatory and safety standards for the vessels.”
A teleconference on the proposed schedule will be held 10 a.m. Nov. 4. To participate, call 1-800-315-6338 and punch in code 03902#.