Staten Islanders know that the residents of the other four boroughs roll their eyes when we talk about how we often feel like the “forgotten borough.”
But if you want a perfect illustration of what fuels such discontent out here, look no further than the unfathomable mess that Staten Island Ferry service has become.
By law, there is supposed to be service on the ferry at least every half hour around the clock.
That means 24 hours a day, seven days and week, 365 days a year. Again, by law, thanks to a measure championed by then-City Councilman James Oddo (R-Mid-Island), passed by the Council in 2013 and signed by then-Mayor Michael Bloomberg.
The service has been anything but lately and Staten Islanders are right to be furious about it.
Instead of ferry service around the clock, we’ve gotten ‘round-the-clock service disruptions. And forget the mandated half-hourly service. These days we can’t even reliably get normal rush-hour service, when boats are supposed to run even more frequently.
Chaos descended on Aug. 3, when overnight service was suspended and boats ran only hourly because a large number of ferry workers had called in sick. The St. George and Whitehall ferry terminals were jammed with fuming commuters.
The root causes of the disruptions, we’re told, are an overall labor shortage aboard the boats as well as a recent uptick in COVID cases among ferry workers.
Full ferry service was scaled back during the COVID-19 pandemic but was set to be restored in August of 2021 as the city emerged from the worst of the health emergency. But the Advance the following month began reporting on ferry staff shortages and what would become regular service disruptions.
The Marine Engineers’ Beneficial Association (MEBA), the union that represents ferry captains, assistant captains, mates, chief engineers and marine engineers, said that hiring and retaining staff has long been a challenge due to the city’s refusal to offer competitive wages in an industry that’s currently in high demand.
So hammering out a new contract with the union must be at the top of Mayor Eric Adams’ list.
But it strains credulity for Adams to say that the ferry mess “dropped in our laps yesterday.” This situation has been percolating for the better part of a year, including these first seven months of Adams’ mayoralty.
The mayor also said that those absent ferry workers who weren’t actually sick should report to work, an inference that there was a sickout underway. The union strongly rejected that notion.
We don’t know for sure, but other city agencies don’t seem to be suffering the same crippling effects from the recent COVID uptick. We can’t blame City Hall for being at least somewhat skeptical about the ferry workers.
Whoever’s right, this situation can’t go on. The constant service disruptions are harming Staten Islanders and are technically a violation of the law. Do borough advocates need to launch a lawsuit to get everybody’s attention?
In the face of the service disruptions, the city suggested that Staten Islanders seek alternate forms of transportation into Manhattan. With no subway linking us to the rest of the city, how many alternatives do city officials think we have?
We can either drive into Manhattan, take an express bus or grab an Uber or Lyft vehicle. Some Islanders can take a city bus into Brooklyn and get the subway.
Most of those choices add increased commuting costs and would almost assuredly make for longer commutes. That’s hardly fair to Staten Islanders.
Boats from the NYC Fast Ferry fleet have taken up some of the slack during the recent service disruptions, but that’s not a long-term solution seeing as those boats are far smaller than the Staten Island Ferry vessels.
No, getting the Staten Island Ferry back on track and giving Staten Islanders the full service they are entitled to by law is the only answer. We’re an island. Ferry service is critical to us.
Operating the Staten Island Ferry shouldn’t be this hard.
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August 14, 2022 at 06:00PM
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Stop breaking the law: Give Staten Islanders the ferry service they’re entitled to | Our Opinion - SILive.com
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