Steamship Authority licensed deck officers, also known as captains and pilots, say that they are frustrated that a new contract between their union and Steamship management hasn’t been signed since the previous one expired this summer.
Negotiations between the Steamship Authority and Teamsters Local 59, a labor union that represents around 400 employees in the ferry line, have been ongoing since January. The three-year contract expired on July 26, and licensed deck officers had been sailing under the terms of the old agreement for months now.
The two parties most recently met on Friday, and still had not reached an agreement.
While the lack of a contract prevents raises, Steamship captains told The Times their biggest issue was regarding the current work-hour structure — which requires them to work 18 hours within a 24-hour period. The union and licensed deck officers are pursuing the industry standard of working 12 hours within a 24-hour work period.
Islanders were shocked to hear that a contract hadn’t been signed yet during a public forum hosted by the Steamship Authority on Nov. 19 , several questioning what the holdup was.
“That seems cruel,” Kate Warner, a West Tisbury resident, said during the forum. “It seems to me if we’re having trouble attracting people — which I understand is a problem across the ferry systems of the U.S. — we’re not going to attract people if we can’t work through these negotiations and support our crews.”
Steamship Authority General Manager Robert Davis said the ferry line appreciates the hard work of its employees, but he didn’t give a definitive answer on when a contract might be finalized; he did offer that the ferry line will keep working on the contract.
Steamship captains and pilots also attended the event, passing out information sheets listing concerns they shared with residents, and quietly supported Vineyarders, many of whom have been stalwart advocates of the ferry line’s workers.
“[Islanders] deal with a lot of frustration with what’s going on,” Steamship Captain Isaiah Stevens told The Times. “They’ve had our back, we have their back.”
As contract details are still being hashed out, Steamship Authority Communications Director Sean Driscoll and Teamsters Local 59 President Jeffrey Sharp both declined to provide details, saying they wouldn’t “negotiate in the press.”
However, Sharp was willing to say that the most difficult aspect under negotiation was the crew members’ schedules, something for which the union has publicly rebuked the Steamship Authority.
“Changing that is extremely difficult,” Sharp told The Times. “Our members have made it very clear what they’re willing to do for their schedule.”
The U.S. Coast Guard granted the Steamship an exemption for crew to work the 18-hours more than 20 years ago, which never dissipated despite recommendations to do so. Consultants hired by the Steamship Authority in 2018 recommended the 12-hour work schedule to combat fatigue in crew members, and to make sure ferry operations were not impacted.
Three Steamship captains sat down with The Times for a recent interview where they said the ferry line had actually come forward with a tentative agreement in August that addressed work schedule, fatigue, and quality-of-life issues, before it was retracted.
“We were at the one-yard line,” Steamship Captain Scott Matoian said.
The captains said maintaining the vessel schedules, which they say have increased ferry trips over the years, was what seemed to have driven the Steamship representatives to pull away from the work schedule amendment.
Steamship Captain Kevin Mitchell said a point the union tried to underscore was that the current work schedule made it especially difficult for crew members who commuted from far away, like Boston or Rhode Island — a situation highlighting the high living costs on the Cape and Islands. This was particularly so if they were being asked to come in four to five days a week. Stevens said “at least half” of unlicensed crew members were from Rhode Island.
The captains also trek from farther away to sail out of Woods Hole. Stevens lives in Fairhaven, and Mitchell lives in Barnstable, while Matoian commutes from Weymouth.
Switching over to the new work schedule would allow for crew members to work more overtime, and eventually eliminate the crewing issues the Steamship has experienced, the captains say. U.S. Coast Guard regulations mandate rest periods for mariners, so the captains say adopting the new work schedule would allow for more rest, and more available working hours for crew members.
“We understand that things can’t change overnight,” Matoian said. “This will be something that we have to ease into.”
Crew shortages have impacted Steamship trips this year, often caused by the absence of just one person. Steamship vessels actually sailed under a condensed schedule compared with previous years, partly driven by a global maritime worker shortage.
The captains emphasized that during the past few years, crew members sacrificed many days off to have vessels continue sailing.
“The amount of work we did to keep the boats running is why you never heard ‘crew shortage,’” Mitchell said.
While this year saw numerous vessel cancellations caused by crew shortages — including a “disaster” weekend in August that prompted several Steamship officials to call for improved management of the ferry line — Driscoll was not worried about the unsigned contract impacting recruitment. He pointed to the 50 vessel employees recruited this year, and said the SSA is “overstaffed at the entry-level positions, which is the foundation for future promotions.”
Still, the captains told The Times it can take years for an unlicensed crew member to earn a license. Add to that, multiple licensed deck officers will be entitled to retire in the next few years. That was a concern shared by Steamship Captain Sean O’Connor, who retired in September.
Some licensed deck officers have also questioned whether the Steamship Authority was prioritizing infrastructure projects over its workforce, which Driscoll pushed back on, calling the notion “categorically false.”
“The single largest element of the recent fare adjustments was an increase of $7.8 million in employee wages,” he said. “We have tripled our training expenses in the past three years, and are budgeted to spend $1.2 million next year. The need for capital investments in our vessels and infrastructure is wholly unrelated to investments in the workforce, which we continue to make.”
Although there are contract disagreements, the captains still love their jobs, and take pride in sailing the ferries.
“They’ve taken a lot away, but it’s still a really good job,” Stevens said. “I like going to it. My son’s 14; he wants to go to Mass Maritime to work on the water. It’s a great career.”
“We love our jobs. We love running the boats,” Matoian said. “We just want to be respected. We just want to be appreciated. We want to be compensated based on … what the rest of the industry is doing.”
“We hope this gets done,” Matoian said regarding the contract negotiations.
Including the licensed deck officers, Teamsters have been negotiating a total of six labor contracts with the Steamship Authority, some of which have been resolved.
They aren’t the only union the Steamship Authority is negotiating with. Negotiations are ongoing with the labor unions SEIU Local 888 and MEBA’s District No. 1PCD, the latter representing the ferry line’s engine department employees. The Steamship Authority board entered into an executive session on Nov. 19 to discuss the continuing contract negotiations with the three unions.
