[Bboa-members] Waterfront Commission Meeting

[Janet Cobb]

Paul, I think your suggestion of an equality clause would be a good 
idea.  We can't help it that this place hasn't been managed like a business 
over time.  I believe houseboat owners have paid the bills sent to them by 
the City every time.  You are absolutely correct, there is nothing special 
about the houseboat community.  They have paid and they should receive -- 
and have been told by Commission and Staff that Marina funds would be used 
to rebuild the docks if they followed the public process.

Your stance on H & I is fascinating.  You sat through two years of meetings 
and professional presentations smiling and nodding. H&I residents begged to 
have those docks repaired in the same configuration.  We were sent on 
another fool's errand.   I appreciate your creative spirit, but you have 
City-paid-for engineering reports that say that the city is renting out 
unsafe docks. Lisa Corona, then Waterfront and now Deputy City Manger, told 
us in no uncertain terms that the pilings and docks were rotten to the 
point of not being restorable.  That report is years old now.  What kind of 
slum lord situation are you perpetuating by more delays? Are you seconding 
Brad Smith's stated list of options at last month's meeting that 
privitizing or closing down the Marina were being looked at up 
town?  Perhaps we can explore the berthers forming a non-profit corporation 
and running the place.  Would that mean that we would all get free berth 
rental?

The Harbor Master and Waterfront Manager sent notices out a year ago that 
all sewer system outlets be brought inside the boats.  For some of us that 
meant going through the permitting process and expending large sums of 
money to comply.  This, to date, is another thing that has not been 
enforced.  I believe that all docks in the Marina that have liveaboards 
should include sewers such as Pelican Harbor in Sausalito does.  Sewers 
aren't that expensive when you consider the environmental degradation and 
public health infractions that we all know are happening on a daily 
basis.  You are absolutely correct, houseboats paid for the sewer and it 
has been available to a thousand other boaters and guest boats.  It is a 
complete wreck at this time because of delayed replacement, which, based on 
Commission-Staff-Council
current stated intentions, will go on into the future.

Other points you address.  I'm sure you are correct about the docks not 
being sufficiently well built for heavy boats.  One might wonder why the 
management of the Marina permitted an enormous two-berth, three-story boat 
to replace a much smaller one-story modest boat.   I wonder why the City of 
Berkeley recruited houseboats at all way back then?  I've been told they 
represented a steady source of income.  I guess the City didn't see fit to 
retrofit the docks to meet their recruitees' weights.  They must have 
considered the boats about equal in weight to large cruising vessels. Your 
expertise would have been most helpful too them in making the correct 
calculations.  Are you suggesting that the City condemn the entire H& I, 
buy the houseboats at fair market value, destroy them or create floating 
hotels and restaurants and call it a day?  Is that what you are dancing 
around about, Paul?  If so, give me a ring.  I'm very interested in any 
business-like proposal.

Your dedication to the waterfront is truly inspirational, Paul.  I'm sure 
by working together we can find the perfect solution to all of these notty 
challenges.  Best wishes.  Janet                    p.s.  Paul, you 
mentioned that the transit authority asked you for help with siting and 
permitting the ferry.  Does that mean that you have a major conflict
                                     in promoting same?  Will you be 
working with them under contract to do what you said they asked?  I'm 
curious about this matter and I'm 
sure                                  others might also be confused about 
proper roles and responsibilities.


Bottom line,
>On 3/9/2006 at 9:19 AM Janet Cobb wrote:
>
> >A small addition:  The houseboat community has paid into the
> >Marina Fund for forty years now.  They have helped pay for
> >maintenance, repair and  replacement of docks throughout the
> >Marina.
>
>*All* the berthers have been doing that for forty years. I don't
>see anything special about the houseboat community compared to
>the live-aboard community or the boat-berthing community at
>large. Maybe we don't have a marina-specific constitutional
>"equal protection" clause, but the principle applies. In fact
>for many years the floating home owners were paying less than
>a live-aboard sailboat of the same length.
>
> >They paid for their own sewers; they pay their own electrical
> >and on and on.
>
>The sewers are worn out, so that investment has pretty much
>lost its value. Also, remember that only the floating home
>owners need dedicated sewer lines in the first place. This has
>become an extra burden imposed on marina infrastructure
>maintenance by the floating homes, and not the other way
>around as you suggest. (There is a pump-out station on
>G-dock, so that requirement does not justify the sewers on
>H and I. And besides, pump-out station sewer volume is "a drop
>in the bucket" compared to sewage from floating homes.)
>
>On electricity: All berthers pay for their own electricity,
>whether via meter or via an estimated flat rate. Nothing
>special about the floating homes here. I don't understand your
>point at all.
>
> >They do not go cruising and pay half fees for their slips to
> >be held.
>
>What does half-rate have to do with this? Except that the
>marina usually comes out ahead on the deal when a half-rate
>berth is assigned temporarily to another boat.
>
> >They sit and pay each and every month:  a dependable source
> >of revenue.
>
>Just like every other berther in the Marina.
>
> >Yes, they pay property tax, which goes up town into the
> >general fund, in addition to the fees that go into the Marina
> >Fund.
>
>I pay property taxes to Berkeley too. Every boat owner pays
>property tax on their home to one city and county or another.
>But marina services still come out of the Marina Fund and from
>my berth payments, even though I think my property taxes to the
>City and County should cover some of this. It's just as
>"unfair" to me as it is to you. Really, this line of reasoning
>can be carried to absurdity, but the point is that we all pay
>taxes and not all of it is spent on things that we actually
>use.
>
> >They are 13 slips out of 1100, a fact that should be kept in
> >mind.
>
>I keep this very much in mind. The special interests of 13
>floating home owners should be taken into account, but only in
>proportion to their numbers.
>
> >The most important fact out of this meeting is that several
> >commissioners allowed as how they don't know anything about
> >the docks.  It makes it so much easier to make decisions when
> >you don't know anything!
>
>That statement was made in the context of the technical
>decisions about dock materials and design/contracting
>procedures.
>
>Remember that some of us on the Waterfront Commission have
>considerable professional experience in closely related
>fields. What I see as the big problem with the H-I rebuild
>as originally bid is that the dock configuration is very
>different from what would be designed without accommodating
>the floating homes, and this is likely to be very expensive
>over the long term as lost revenue.
>
>For starters, the new proposed berths are too big and
>misplaced. There is whole row of new downwind 40-ft berths
>in Emeryville, for example, still vacant 15 months after the
>coming online. Our market in this size is mostly sailboats,
>but these new 40-ft berths have been proposed for one of the
>shallowest spots in the Marina, requiring dredging now and
>likely to case a shoaling problem a few years down the road.
>The market peaks in the 30-40 ft size range, and in view of
>our shoaling problem outside the marina entrance, Berkeley
>will become less attractive to 40 and over and more
>attractive to 35 and under as time goes by.
>
>All the other new proposed berths are 48' and 52', placed
>near or between floating homes, and these have historically
>been difficult to market. There have been unsold vacancies
>on H and I docks for all of the eight years that I've been
>reviewing the vacancy reports, this despite waiting lists
>for other docks. It has been asserted that this is because
>the H and I berths are cross-wind. But crosswind didn't
>seem to be that much of drawback on the old F and G docks,
>which were also crosswind. Some of us have been around long
>enough to remember the old F and G docks, and to have
>sailed in and out of them. Sure an upwind or downwind
>orientation is better, but the fact is, most prospective
>marina berthers in that size range would rather not place
>their yacht in the middle of a houseboat community. To
>assert that this problem will go away with a change to
>upwind-downwind configuration is pure conjecture. Sure,
>there will be a small improvement, but we will still have
>a large number of new 48' and 52' berths between floating
>homes that will be difficult to market.
>
>Bottom line: The configuration of H and I as originally
>bid is a substantial give-way to the floating homes. I can
>understand why you want it: The value of those homes is
>significantly enhanced by new docks that are designed
>to optimize floating home berthing. I'd push for it too if
>I were in your position. But it will have long-lasting
>negative impact on the Marina Fund's balance sheet, and it's
>not fair to the rest of the marina berthers who will pay the
>freight.
>
> >Per their request, I'm going to give a walk through to a
> >couple of Commissioners.  I suggest that others may want
> >to do the same, or perhaps we should coordinate a Boat
> >Owner's Association tour of the docks.  Please advise.
>
> >Janet
>
>We all recognize that docks H and I are in poor condition.
>But I have to wonder about your cleat pull-outs, Janet.
>Those docks were designed for boats having maybe one tenth
>the crosswind "sail area" of a large floating home, and in
>your case, didn't you just make your entire boat one deck
>higher?
>
>I think when a large high-windage box of a floating home
>is put into a space designed for a yacht, some burden of
>responsibility falls on the floating home owner to upgrade
>the attachment points at their own expense.
>
>Is it really fair to the entire community of Berkeley boat
>berthers for the City to have to go the expense of putting
>in extra pilings just to hold your oversized floating home
>in place?
>
>---------
>Paul Kamen
>Chair, Berkeley Waterfront Commission
>510-540-7968  510-219-8106 (cell)
>pk at well.com   www.BerkeleyWaterfront.org