Breaking resolution on cruise ships needs commission approval
The latest phase of
the Navy's $36 million project to dredge Key West Harbor and the
shipping channel leading into the harbor means the Outer Mole Pier —
used by the city for cruise ship docking — will be closed for six
months.
This project has been
in the works since the Navy announced in 2002 that it would retain
ownership of the pier and allow the city to use it. In March, city
officials said they would tap its reserve fund for about a half-million
dollars to cover the loss of one of three piers used by cruise ships.
Of the two remaining
piers, Mallory Pier is owned by the city but too small for some cruise
ships that make port calls here, and Pier B is privately owned and the
city receives only 25 percent of the fees collected from passengers. The
city receives 100 percent of those fees when the ship docks at Mallory
or the Outer Mole.
The Outer Mole Pier's
closure has forced either 62 or 64 cruise ships to cancel or alter their
docking schedules, depending on which number you choose to take from
Port Director Raymond Archer's mass e-mail to clarify "misinformation"
in a Citizen article.
Archer says in the
e-mail that 14 cruise ships have canceled their port calls, 25 will
anchor offshore and 23 will be diverted to Pier B behind the Hilton. The
numbers add up to 62, but he also lists 64 at a different point in the
e-mail, which jibes with what he told Citizen reporter Tim O'Hara in
March — and 16 of the 64 had canceled.
But enough about the
details of this multimillion-dollar business that the city can't seem to
get enough of.
The juggling by city
port officials and budgeteers to adapt to the closure of one-third of
the cruise ship piers sounded reasonable until almost two weeks ago,
when it was discovered that limits to dockage at Pier B would be
relaxed.
The city commission
decided a decade ago to allow only seven cruise ships per week to dock
at Pier B. Environmentalists say the cap was in response to residents'
concerns about cruise ships overwhelming Key West. City officials say
they wanted to hold the number at seven so city-owned piers would get
more business and generate more revenue for the city.
Regardless of the
force behind the city's resolution, the decision by staff to waive it
without discussion by the city commission is inappropriate. The dredging
was not sprung on the city at the last minute, it was announced, vetted
through public meetings and discussed at great length.
Rules are made by our
elected officials, who represent all of the citizens of Key West, and
when they are going to be tossed aside, that vote should be made in
public by the people we have entrusted to speak for us.
Decision-making by a
few members of the staff, without a public hearing and input, only
encourages the suspicion that already surrounds the city's apparent
addiction to cruise ships. |
