Waterfront Politics -- Shilshole Bay Marina Fees Can't Make Up For Port's Poor Business Decisions

Editor, The Times:

Your editorial, "Shilshole as a business," (Oct. 6) was misdirected and distorted. First of all Shilshole Bay Marina is a business that brings $3.6 million into the general fund of the Port, not the $1 million that has recently been put forth. One million dollars is what the Port gives back to Shilshole for its operation. The rest goes into the Port's general fund to aid all the other Port operations that lose money.

It's also a business that gives the Port a return of more than 23 percent on its investment. That doesn't sound like a subsidy to me.

Shilshole is in fact the only Port of Seattle operation that is in the black - which makes it a particularly attractive cash cow for the cash-starved Port, especially because of all the poor business decisions the Port has made lately.

But you really missed the boat when it comes to the live-aboard community at Shilshole. To begin with, in 1994 a Port appointed live-aboard committee came up with a few facts concerning Shilshole:

-- Live-aboards (vs. non-live-aboards) actually save the marina about $4.66 per person, due to the savings in security costs.

-- The monthly fees paid by live-aboards in other marinas usually reflect the fact that those marinas do not meter their electricity and do not charge for their showers, the exception being Elliott Bay Marina whose ridiculous fee is set up to discourage live-aboards altogether.

-- The live-aboards at Shilshole save Seattle over a million gallons of water per month compared with average households.

-- When you consider that a person living on their boat pays state sales tax on their home when they purchase it, and the live-aboards at Shilshole pay a 12.84 percent leaseholders tax, live-aboards pay more than their fair share of taxes.

-- The live-aboard lifestyle is low impact to the environment and should be encouraged, not discouraged.

We are a neighborhood like any other in the city, and our community group is a member of the Ballard District Council.

So get your facts straight before you attack a whole community.

And as a tenant of Shilshole, I'm not subsidized, I'm moored in a marina that has dropped from a 12-year to a 2 1/2-year waiting list, one that is readily accessible to the public, all they have to do is wait their turn. Dean Moller Seattle