UPDATED: Community Water Taxi Performed 10 Percent of All Their Trips – Ever – in Past Week

Saturday, June 1, 2024 at 8:30 p.m.
by Jeff Noedel

Tom Bridge, of Crane Island, is one of the five leaders of Orcas Island-based Community Water Taxi (CWT). Bridge is licensed captain who performs most of the CWT runs.

CWT sprang into existence nine months ago, almost as an impulsive reaction to Washington State Ferries inter-island service collapsing at the time of the 2023 San Juan County Fair. CWT swings into action when WSF’s inter-island service falters. To the people whom CWT has delivered to chemo treatments in Friday Harbor, or jobs on another island, CWT’s trips feel more like rescues.

CWT serves as the middle man. It does the operational and marketing functions and maybe someday have a dispatcher. But the actual ferrying is done by private operators who do not work directly for CWT. In January, Bridge told CNL2 he envisioned a new “mosquito fleet” of independent operators making runs dispatched by CWT.

To date, CWT has provided more than 220 passenger trips (some are repeat users; some trips carry more than one passenger). Twenty of those trips happened in the past week.

Demand for CWT quieted, but did not stop, during its first winter in operation. One factor in WSF’s reduction to some degree of canceled trips due to crewing has been, coincidentally, another water taxi named Paraclete Water Taxi & Private Charter Service, operated out of Anacortes and owned by Kevin and Tami Fegert of Blakely Island. Paraclete has been ferrying WSF captains, mates, and engineers between Anacortes and the San Juan terminals each day, and WSF proudly points to that service for making a difference.

But demand for CWT services started to rise a day or two, coincidentally, after Governor Jay Inslee visited Friday Harbor in early May with the message that things are on the mend at WSF. CNL2 cannot report on the Governor’s precise words at the meeting at the fairgrounds because the press was not invited to that meeting. Widespread publicity after the Governor left was controlled by the Governor’s press team.

But soon after, cancelations due to insufficient crewing rose. The past week has felt like the old days of 2023. Ominously, ferry service on the morning of Saturday, May 25 — the beginning of Memorial Day Weekend stumbled, but WSF worked hard to get things back on track and the rest of the crucial holiday weekend service went without incident. Tuesday, May 28 was the next day of disruptions, when inter-island service simply ended in the 4:00 o’clock hour due to lack of crew for the evening watch. Inter-island service simply collapsed Tuesday afternoon. People needing to get home inter-island had to find other ways. And then the 57-year-old Yakima went out of service Friday morning.

Bridge uses his personal “six pack” motor boat to zip passengers around at 22 to 24 knots cruising speed (the big ferries cruise at 15 to 18 knots). “Six pack” means the boat can seat up to six people, including the captain. He suggests a $40 fare, but will work with people in need. The only official subsidy CWT receives is a valuable voucher issued by San Juan County (see CNL2’s interview of Richard Uri) for low-income or disabled persons and seniors.

On Friday, Bridge was a bridge between islands for 20 citizens in need. And he noticed he was not the only private boat owner moving people across the waters where the WSF inter-island boat was supposed to be. Bridge told CNL2 he believes he saw 40 to 60 citizens being ferried on private boats between the islands Friday. He told CNL2 that he shuttles passengers to Lopez Island less frequently and Shaw Island rarely, but this week he has moved people between all four of the largest islands in the County. Said Bridge, “It doesn’t feel like the crisis is over.”

Bridge believes several key cancelations Friday were not clearly communicated with WSF emails and texts. He feels “under-communicating” from WSF’s centralized Customer Service department made Friday’s problems worse. His opinion that there was a lack of public-facing communications led him to a second opinion: that WSF should establish some kind of hotline to San Juan County, the Sheriff’s Department, or the Ferry Lovers of Washington (FLOW) community action group in Friday Harbor.

FLOW steering committee member Laura Jo Severson, an experienced Red Cross volunteer, has designed a “Stranded Passenger” assistance program that would provide food and shelter if there is ever a repeat of the 2023 Memorial Day debacle, in which 100+ cars and their occupants were stranded on the Friday Harbor terminal parking lot after the final boat off the island was canceled. Unable to check back into booked-up hotels, the hundreds of visitors were unable to access bathrooms or buy food. They slept in their cars. The only problem in the design of Severson’s rescue program: there is no mechanism by which WSF Customer Service or Operations Departments would directly contact San Juan County if it decides to cancel the final boat of the night (which happened 2023 Memorial Day weekend and to some extent Tuesday). WSF has suggested if Severson wants to know when a last boat out has been canceled, she or other FLOW members should simply read every WSF email or text alert in real time, every night of the year.