Costs for Vineyarders getting a vehicle on and off the Island may not be increasing under the latest Steamship Authority budget proposal. And passenger fees may not be going up as much as initially proposed.
That’s from an Oct. 15 Steamship board meeting when treasurer and comptroller Mark Rozum shared that his office has adjusted that budget by about $2 million.
The Steamship, earlier this month, announced that it would have to raise rates across the board — what officials called its largest fare increase — to offset a deficit in next year’s budget. Included in that increase, Vineyard excursion rates would have risen $3.50 in the off-season and $5 in the season.
The rate hikes would help pay off a $152.8 million budget, an 11 percent increase from the current fiscal year, driven largely by payroll increases.
But with the latest readjusting by Rozum, the Steamship is giving relief to Islanders by not raising excursion rates. Additionally, the latest budget proposal also showed one-way passenger tickets increasing by only 50¢ for adults, 25¢ for children and seniors, $4 for a 10-ride adult book, $2 for a 10-ride child or senior book, and $10.50 for a 46-ride book. That’s about half of what was originally proposed.
The budget’s growth from last year comes from spikes in different parts of Steamship operations, including $8.8 million more for employee wages and benefits, $1.3 million more in IT costs, and $1.2 million more in vessel and landside maintenance costs.
The Steamship is also expecting fewer riders in key categories, as Rozum expected a decrease of 17,000 passengers and 23,000 cars, compared with the 2024 budget. His figures were based on traffic from August 2023 through this July.
In response to the rate increases, Falmouth representative Peter Jeffrey reflected on the Steamship being restricted to a farebox-only funding model, and wondered whether the state legislature could make changes.
“We face the difficulty of a 64-year-old Enabling Act with a farebox-only operation that didn’t contemplate the capital expenses an authority would have from 1960 now into 2024, with coastal resiliency, the cost of new vessels, as well as trying to move perhaps to more carbon-neutral vessels,” he said.
“This statute is not perfect, and I am not one to defend the way we’re funded,” he added.
Jeffrey recommended considering how the Washington State Ferry system, which is operated by the state’s transportation department, is funded. He was also interested in ways to reduce financial impacts to the Island’s commuting workforce.
“In many ways, that 50-cent passenger increase is not going to just impact tourists coming to the Island, but the workforce coming to the Island,” he said. “We’ve basically now imposed a commuter tax.”
Vineyard board member James Malkin reluctantly accepted the increases at the Tuesday board meeting. “I do regret that we have to have these increases, but in looking at the numbers, I see no way around them,” he said.
The board took no vote on the new figures; nor did the Port Council on Oct. 1.
Rozum and assistant treasurer Courtney Oliveira will address the public this week at open houses on the rate proposals. They will appear tomorrow from 5 to 7 pm at the Tisbury Senior Center.
