Shipyard Quarters Marina Life: Martin Oliner, please fix your marina and don't take our homes!

Posted on the marina gate on 10/27, four days before the new 31% rate increase was due.

Residents of Shipyard Quarters Marina in Charlestown Ma. are sick with dread today. They returned to their floating homes to find a bulletin posted on the Marina gate stating that if they do not pay their winter rent in full by November first, they will be charged a penalty of $6 per foot, per day. Considering the average resident’s boat length is 45 feet, that’s $270 a day (or $8100 per month). The problem is the marina sent residents new Winter contracts [leases] in September with a modest rate increase, nothing too unusual there, but just three days ago (a week before the November 1 due date) the marina voided the September contract, and sent out a new contract with a 31% increase. Now it’s important to understand that marina residents are not millionaires with 80ft yachts. Residents are people who among other things are retired Army, Navy, Coast guard, a few nurses, a roofer, a teacher, an IT guy, and even two retired Purple Heart recipients. So what’s the problem? Well, most of the residents – like many of us – live paycheck to paycheck and had saved the $4600 for the November 1^st deadline, but now they need to scrape up an extra $2000 by the 1^st (Tuesday) or they will be charged $270 dollars a day, effectively making the rent a moving target that many will not be able to keep up with ($270 day, $1890 week, $8100 month) plus the $6600 winter rate. This means that Martin Oliner, Mayor of Lawrence, NY and Shipyard Quarters Marina landlord could be the proud owner of a lot of floating homes by spring. Unfortunately November is the busiest time of the year for marinas and boat yards in Boston so marina tenants are unlikely to have the option to relocate. Bottom line, if the tenants can’t come up with the last minute rent increase, they risk losing their homes.

The irony in this story is that prior to all this drama marina residents considered asking Marty if they could pay monthly instead of in full for fear that the city might condemn the marina (although to date, Marty’s lawyers have been schooling the city in the courtroom so no repairs are expected any time soon). The marina has been falling apart and is an eyesore in the otherwise beautiful Charlestown Navy Yard. A dock piling has fallen down ever month since summer – one just missed a boat and another went over today. More than half the pilings have small to massive holes at the water line so it’s only a matter of time. Residents have also endured smoking electrical posts, homeless folks occasionally inhabiting the marina showers, entire docks capsized, the gate security lock broken, and up until several months ago the ramp from the parking lot to the dock had partially broken loose and was not repaired for over four months (at least the marina posted a laminated 8 x 11 on the ramp that warned “Use the ramp at your own risk and only one person at a time” – comforting). Of course it’s the only ramp in the marina so if you chose not to risk it you weren’t going home. Most tenants (some who've lived at the marina for 15 or more years) have never actually seen Marty and he did not reply to an email last year requesting to have a meeting about the state of the Marina.

Update (today) 10/28: Marina residents have been informed that Martin Oliner or his representative will be coming to the marina the beginning of next week to see to the disconnection of electricity and water to all boats that don’t have the new winter dockage fee paid in full.