At least one member of the Steamship Authority Board says he has lost trust in the general manager of the Steamship Authority to run the ferry service, following the release of an internal investigation relating to the untethering of the Sankaty in July.
Falmouth representative Peter Jeffrey said that he will ask his fellow board members at their next meeting to consider going into executive session to discuss general manager Bob Davis’ contract, with the possibility of not renewing it in another year. According to Jeffrey, Davis is in year two of a three-year contract, and the board is required to give Davis a one-year notice if they do not plan on extending his contract. That notice would have to be given this summer.
The Falmouth board member said that based on the results of an internal investigation of the Sankaty and the lack of transparency the general manager provided to Steamship representatives, he has lost confidence in his leadership.
“The lack of candor is outrageous and I think it shows an overall failure of management to hold the Steamship accountable. We’re lucky no one died,” Jeffrey told The Times. “I have no trust in the general manager at this point.”
An internal investigation by the Steamship — obtained by The Times through a records request at the end of October — found that employees say they had reported that staff was not following procedure when securing the Sankaty to its dock, days and hours before the freight boat came loose.
Multiple representatives to the Steamship, including Jeffrey and Vineyard board representative Jim Malkin, said that they were never informed of the results of the internal investigation until The Times published an article last week.
Jeffrey said that he had met with Davis the day before the news article came out, along with other Port Council members, and he said the general manager failed to mention the results of the internal investigation. “I was gobsmacked,” he said.
Malkin also expressed frustration with how he was informed of the results of the internal investigation. He said that he was in another meeting when his phone started ringing off the hook.
Both Jeffrey and Malkin, who were both highly critical of Davis during his performance review in September, say that the documents of the investigation — which was compiled through statements of Steamship employees — offer much greater detail to the Sankaty incident than what had been provided to the board in previous meetings.
Jeffrey said that he is also considering putting a motion on the table at the board’s next meeting that would require the Steamship to inform the board secretary if a record’s request from the public is denied.
The Steamship originally denied The Times’ record request for internal documents relating to the Sankaty, protesting that the issue was a personnel matter. But after an appeal, Massachusetts supervisor of records Manza Arthur ruled that the documents should be released as part of the records request.
“I don’t need to know every request that goes out, but from a policy standpoint, the secretary should know when we deny a records request,” Jeffrey said.
The Steamship has since issued a statement to the release of the internal investigation.
“The Steamship Authority’s decision to initially withhold employee statements regarding the July 27, 2023, incident was made to support and nurture the culture of openness that underpins our Safety Quality Management System, or SQMS. The success of the SQMS depends on the ability of employees to confidentially report hazards, issues, concerns, occurrences, and incidents, as well as to propose solutions and safety improvements. It was our concern that releasing these statements would undermine the Safety Quality Management System that the entire company has worked diligently to create and follow. Furthermore, the Authority was and remains unable to comment on any disciplinary sanctions that may have been issued against Authority employee(s) referred to in the statements.
“At no time did the Authority seek to mislead any member of the public or Authority governance about the cause of the incident, and the Authority has already released numerous security videos and investigatory documents to various media outlets upon request,” the statement continues. “We are thankful and extremely fortunate that there was no loss of life, injury, serious damage, or environmental damage as a result of this incident. As a result of this root cause analysis, we have updated the SQMS to reflect the Authority’s revised training procedures on line handling.”
The Steamship board is scheduled to meet on Tuesday, November 21.
It’s encouraging to see, at least some members of, the Board fully engaged. It will be interesting to see the reaction in the host communities to management after years of being snubbed by the monopoly.
“that releasing these statements would undermine the Safety Quality Management System that the entire company has worked diligently to create and follow.” what a false statement. If the authority was diligently following its SQMS guidelines the first report of the boat being unsafe and employees actions being lack would have had a procedural response and been DILIGENTLY addressed AVOIDING the boat coming loose. There is nothing diligent about this incident or the Steamship. Someone please wake up and wipe the sleepy from your eyes. Davis has poorly managed this “lifeline” for YEARS. The sole purpose of this company is to provide a service to the island. How much is the marketing budget on getting new visitors and repeat visitors even when exceeding previous reservations numbers while increasing rates blowing through budgets.
Fire the Board.
Fire the County Commissioners.
Fire the voters.
Happy to read this article. Hopefully they are ALL on board..no pun intended
In reality, crew members from nearby boats as well as shoreside personnel should have gone directly to the boat and retired the lines. The captain responsible should then be held accountable. That managements response is about a flaw in the SQMS system is nonsense. It just underscores the disconnect between management and personnel that has existed for years. A case of SQMS versus common sense.
Is this reason enough to dissolve the SSA?
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