Assembly explore ferry options

PALMER — With the Mat-Su Borough deciding to seek proposals for how to get its new experimental ferry to Point MacKenzie, the port director is suggesting getting rid of the vessel.

Paying the monthly tab to house the unused ferry is giving the borough assembly quite a bit of heartburn. The bill for a single month to store the M/V Susitna in Ketchikan is $66,000; that’s $792,000 for 12 months.

“I am not in favor of the borough owning and operating a ferry,” Assemblyman Steve Colligan said at a Thursday assembly meeting. “Fifteen to $20,000 a week is the issue at this point.”

Assemblyman Ron Arvin came to the meeting with a suggestion to seek proposals.

“Let’s let people that do this kind of lifting around the world tell us their proposals,” he said.

The proposals sought relate to how to get the ferry from Ketchikan, bring it to Port MacKenzie and store it there, possibly on dry land if that is the most feasible option, possibly in a special cradle. The proposal would also include a section on what it would cost to re-float the ship if the borough finds a use for it.

The assembly agreed — with one dissenting vote from Warren Keogh — to seek Port MacKenzie storage proposals.

Also at the meeting, Marc VanDongen, the borough’s port director, said he thinks the best option the borough has at this point is to keep the vessel in Ketichikan until it can be sold or disposed of through the federal surplus program.

But the director of the borough’s port commission, Dave Cruz, doesn’t share that opinion. He said he thinks the borough should keep the vessel.

Vernon Edwards from Alaska Ship and Drydock, the firm that built the ship, says in a three-page memo to the assembly that there are major problems with the idea of beaching the craft.

For one thing, though the Susitna was designed as a military prototype landing craft, only the bow was designed for landings. The rest of the ship could be damaged if beaching it were attempted.

Also, Edwards wrote, “This vessel has not been designed to be lifted by cranes nor have the demihulls been designed to rest on hard surfaces.”

After it’s on land, there could be problems with everything from the paint to the internal mechanical systems if the ship is mothballed and doesn’t get regular use.

The borough also would need to somehow secure the ship to protect it from theft and vandalism.

At any rate, the assembly has only sought proposals for how to store the ship. The body is keeping its other options open — selling it, surplusing it or handing it over to the state ferry system.

Arvin said the proposals will at least get some data on the table.

“What we don’t know definitively from the marketplace is how much it will cost to bring it up from Ketchikan and dry-dock it,” he said.

Contact reporter Andrew Wellner at andrew.wellner@frontiersman.com or 352-2270.