||| FROM ALEX MACLEOD for SALISH CURRENT |||


It was with certain bemusement that residents of the San Juan Islands greeted news last week that Congress was tossing $4.8 million to Washington State Ferries to upgrade the passenger cabins of ferries that otherwise should be retired and which too often fail to sail for mechanical reasons.

In a way, it fits perfectly with the reality that WSF won’t see a new ferry until at least 2027 and, given WSF’s performance over the past decade, even that is decidedly optimistic. Meanwhile, the fleet, with three boats already at or very near their retirement dates and nine of 21 regarded as unreliable, will continue to be plagued by mechanical problems that keep them tied up, sometimes for just a day, other times for weeks.

But what continues to plague service in the San Juans is not having sufficient crew required by the Coast Guard. This represents a massive management failure of WSF leadership to prepare for the wave of retirements of captains, mates and senior engineers. That failure, and then the failure to take timely steps to recover, have led to thousands of missed sailings that continue almost unabated, especially in the San Juans. 

If there’s one thing an organization should know it’s the ages of its employees. There is no mystery, especially with a robust state pension system, when people will retire. There was going to be a wave of key retirements beginning around 2020. Knowing those positions require several years of training, testing and on-the-job experience to obtain necessary Coast Guard licenses, steps should have been taken beginning in about 2015 to insure adequate crewing.

That didn’t happen, and then the problem was exacerbated when the pandemic vaccination requirement caused more key ferry staff to leave. Still, management didn’t change its entry-level hiring, or its policies to support staff in the licensing process, for more than two years, ensuring the crewing problems will be with us for at least several more years.

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