In July, the National Park Service (NPS) announced that a ten-year concessions contract would be awarded to San Francisco-based Hornblower Yachts, Inc. to provide upgraded ferry service to the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island in New York Harbor.
The Ellis Island/Statue of Liberty route in New York is the most lucrative National Park Service ferry contract. Photo By Patrick Runkle
By Bill Picture
Published: September, 2007
The proposed deal, which is currently awaiting approval by Congress and is expected to take effect in October, has raised some serious concerns among environmentalists in the Bay Area, including Friends of the Earth (FOTE); this is the same advocacy group that, one year earlier, had supported Hornblower’s bid to secure a similar contract to provide ferry service to Alcatraz Island. Although this article focuses on the environmental aspects of the contract, the move has also raised the hackles of Bay Area union members who were displaced when Hornblower took over the Alcatraz route in 2006.
In a letter to Speaker Nancy Pelosi dated July 5, FOTE complained that Hornblower has, thus far, been slow to make good on some of its promises to the NPS regarding minimizing the environmental impact of vessels used to shuttle tourists to and from Alcatraz.
According to Teri Shore, FOTE’s Campaign Director for Clean Vessels, her organization’s decision to publicly support Hornblower’s bid for the Alcatraz Island contract was prompted by the company’s proposed conservation efforts. And Shore suspects that those promises also played a significant role in Hornblower’s selection by the NPS panel. We really put ourselves out on a limb supporting [Hornblower’s] proposal, Shore says. And we’ve never done that before.
The Alcatraz Island contract specifies—among other things—that upon commencement of operations last September, Hornblower’s existing fleet of vessels be outfitted with diesel engines that met or exceeded EPA marine Tier 2 emissions requirements, that existing electric generators be replaced with EPA Tier 2 compliant generators, and that engine exhaust after-treatment devices be installed on all vessels to minimize air pollution.
The new, cleaner-burning engines and generators are already in operation. But the air pollution controls have yet to be installed. That’s a critical piece that hasn’t happened, Shore adds. And we’re being told it probably won’t happen until November. That’s more than a year behind schedule.
Hornblower’s failure to meet this deadline as specified in the contract has FOTE worried, because there’s another much larger and significantly more complicated task on Hornblower’s to-do list. In addition to upgrading its existing fleet, Hornblower also agreed to design and build the first ferry vessel powered by sun and wind. The contract specifies that this state-of-the-art hybrid ferry is to be in operation by September 2008, with a second hybrid ferry to be added by 2010.
To date, FOTE has been unable to confirm the status of the hybrid ferry project. And they fear that Hornblower may be dragging its feet. If that is the case, Shore says it’s unlikely that the NPS’s dream of a hybrid ferry will be realized by this time next year. We’ve heard from sources in the maritime industry that it takes at least two years to design a vessel, build it and test it, she explains. [Hornblower] only has two years to do the whole thing. So any hiccup could seriously delay the project.
But NPS representatives insist that Shore and her colleagues have nothing to worry about. And they say that they are really pleased with Hornblower’s attempts to live up to its contractual obligations.
The delay with the air pollution control, they say, isn’t Hornblower’s fault at all. Rather, it’s a matter of technology’s slow-moving pace.
We tend to be very progressive with the writing of our contracts, explains Rich Weideman, Chief of Public Affairs for the Golden Gate National Recreation Area, which manages Alcatraz Island. In this case, we asked for something that didn’t even exist yet. Weideman says the after-treatment device specified in the contract had to be created from scratch. Therefore, the NPS couldn’t reasonably expect Hornblower to design, build, test, manufacture and install the device before the beginning of the contract period. Weideman estimates that the after-treatment device should be approved and ready to roll by the end of 2007.
As for the hybrid vessel, Weideman and Hornblower CEO Terry MacRae, both report that the project is on-track. [It] is well underway in terms of design and approval, MacRae explains. We’re still shooting for the end of next year.
What’s going to take the most time is the Coast Guard’s approval process, Weideman adds.
Bureaucracy, like the time it will take to get a thumbs-up from the Coast Guard for the air pollution control and the hybrid vessel, is what is referred to in the contract as an excusable delay. Technology’s inability to keep up with the wants and needs of environmentalists, as in the case of the after-treatment device, is another. And, provided a delay in the fulfillment of any contractual commitment is an excusable one, Hornblower cannot be found in default of its agreement.
Teri Shore of Friends of the Earth would like for excusable delays and non-excusable delays to be more clearly defined in the National Park Service’s future concession contracts, including the pending Statue of Island contract. Doing so, she says, would help avoid any potential confusion on the part of the NPS, concessionaires or the public, whose money the NPS is spending. This whole thing is being paid for with public dollars, so when a deadline isn’t met, we deserve to know why. The Park Service knows why, and they’re obviously okay with it. But all we know is that it’s not happening.
Shore would actually like for the entire contract award process to be significantly more transparent. Earlier this year, Shore, on behalf of Friends of the Earth, wrote to the Golden Gate National Recreation Area and the National Parks Service to request a written report detailing Hornblower’s progress meeting the terms of the Alcatraz Island contract. She has yet to receive such a report.
Shore also filed a Freedom of Information Act request with the National Parks Service in order to find out exactly how contracts are awarded. Like with any large organization, contracts are awarded based on a number of factors. What Shore hopes to find out is how much of a role conservation and sustainability play versus other factors, such as price. But the NPS, thus far, has only provided a copy of the final contract. The public deserves to understand why [a company] got [a contract], Shore adds. If a company gets a contract because it promised all kinds of wonderful things, but they don’t do those things, then they should be held accountable.
It is important to note that, in her letter to Speaker Pelosi, Shore never asked that Hornblower be denied the Statue of Liberty contract. Rather, she asked that some kind of a penalty structure be set forth in the new contract to ensure that all deadlines are met. Under the Alcatraz Island contract, Hornblower is not subject to any penalties should it fail to meet a specified deadline, even if the delay is not an excusable one.
But National Parks Service spokesman Rich Weideman doesn’t see the need to impose financial penalties. Because a concessionaire’s contract will eventually need to be renewed, he says it’s ultimately in the company’s best interest to live up to the terms of the contract, including meeting deadlines. Darren Boch, Public Affairs Office for the National Parks of New York Harbor, which manages the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island, says the selection panel for the New York contract was impressed not only with Hornblower’s proposal, but also with what the company has already accomplished in the Bay Area in terms of improving the quality of the service and its conservation efforts. Environmental impact requirements very similar to those in the Alcatraz Island contract are included in the Statue of Liberty contract. Conservation, waste reduction, all of those things were addressed, Boch explains. What we saw, and the selection panel saw, was a whole soup-to-nuts visitor experience. And that’s important, because, at the end of the day, it’s more than just a boat ride.
Weideman adds he’s not surprised that Hornblower came out on top in New York. I ride the [Alcatraz] ferries probably every other day, and they’re so much cleaner and quieter, he adds. They’ve come through in a lot of ways. And they’ve done extra things that weren’t in the contract. For instance, they’re restoring the historic gardens on [Alcatraz] Island. They’ve just been a great partner.
Hornblower Cruises currently operates the Alctraz ferry service for the National Park Service under the Alcatraz Cruises line Photo by Joel Williams
Alcatraz Island is one of the most popular tourist destinations in the Bay Area Photo by Joel Williams
