As interest in WW II and Richmond’s Home Front Festival builds, interest in Richmond’s historic Shipyard 3 is also bursting out.

Honda Imports

With a letter of commitment from Honda, the Port of Richmond is aiming to expand its importation of automobiles in partnership with Auto Warehousing Company. The initiative could add several million dollars a year in net revenue to the Port, which will, in turn, be required to finance as much as $20 million in new port infrastructure – principally an extensive pier side railroad yard. On September 11, the City Council gave its go-ahead to enter into negotiations and plan for bond financing of the necessary improvements.

                ADOPT A RESOLUTION- appointing Bond and Disclosure Counsel and a Financial Advisor; authorize the Finance Director to seek proposals from investment banking and other financial firms to provide financing of certain Port Terminal and related improvements in connection with the proposed expansion of the Auto Warehousing Corporation operation to accommodate importation of Honda Automobiles; direct the Finance Director and Port Director to present the selected financing package to the City Council for review and approval at a future council meeting and authorize the Port's Executive Director to negotiate an amended Lease Agreement with Auto Warehousing Company to incorporate the increased vehicle volumes, capital improvements, and term extensions to accommodate American Honda's vehicle distribution; and direct the Port Director to present the amended Lease Agreement to the City Council for review and approval at a future council meeting - Finance (Jim Goins 620-6740)/Port (Jim Matzorkis (215-4600).

Drydocks

Meanwhile, interest in shipbuilding and ship breaking at the historic Shipyard 3 drydocks continues. See the September 13 story in the Contra Costa Times by Thomas Peele that follows.

At least two high-powered industrial groups have visited the drydocks with an eye on reviving them. First were Frank Foti and Joe O'Rourke of Vigor Industrial, LLC, (Vigor), www.vigorindustrial.net and John Graykowski of International Shipbreaking Limited, LLC, (ISL),  www.shiprecycling.com. Vigor Industrial, LLC, is a leading ship repair and marine construction company headquartered in Portland, Oregon, with operations in Portland, Puget Sound, and the San Francisco Bay Area.  International Shipbreaking Limited, LLC, located in Brownsville, Texas, is the largest ship recycling company in the United States, and has recycled 38 vessels for the Maritime Administration, the U.S. Navy, and commercial customers. 

Second was a team headed by Stas Margaronis of Santa Maria Shipping, who brought in experts from Europe and hired a team of divers to explore the condition of the drydocks.

Use of the drydocks for ship construction or dismantling could bring hundreds of jobs to Richmond for which local residents could be trained.

Historic Buildings

Finally, the City Council also passed a resolution on September 11 that directed City staff to plan for rehabilitation and productive use of some half a million square feet of historic buildings in Shipyard 3, at least half of which are unused or underutilized. This could bring in $1 million or more in revenue for the City of Richmond while saving structures that are part of a national park, listed on the National Register of Historic Places and are California Historic Landmarks. See Saving the Historical Riggers Loft
December 16, 2006

RESOLUTION OF THE CITY COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF RICHMOND MAKING IT A PUBLIC POLICY OBJECTIVE TO MAXIMIZE ECONOMIC BENEFIT FROM UNDERUTILIZED REAL ESTATE ASSETS IN THE PORT OF RICHMOND

WHEREAS, Shipyard 3 includes five historic buildings that are listed in the National Register of Historic Places, that are part of Rosie the Riveter WW II Home Front National Historical Park by an Act of Congress (Public Law 106-352) and are California Historic Landmarks, and

WHEREAS, the five buildings listed below constitute 258,518 square feet of usable space, 203,388 of which is vacant or underutilized (the Machine Shop and Forge are used by Auto Warehousing Company for vehicle preparation), and

WHEREAS, these building are not likely to be removed due to provisions of CEQA, NEPA, Section 106 of the National Historic Preservation Act, Richmond Municipal Code Chapter 6.06, City Council Resolution 129-99, Resolution 46a-00, Resolution 25-02, Resolution 91-06, Goal OSC-E of the General Plan and Policies LU-A.5, CF-K.2, ED-C.3 and OSC-E.2 of the General Plan, and

WHEREAS, Chapter 6.02 of the Richmond Municipal Code defines “demolition by neglect” as “permitting a structure or its components to deteriorate to a state that it becomes economically or functionally impractical to rehabilitate due to damage to structural components or those that define the essential historic characteristics (also see Chapter 9.22),” and requires “the owner, lessees and any other person in actual charge or possession of an historical resource shall prevent demolition by neglect,” and

WHEREAS, it is in the interest of the City of Richmond to be a good steward of its real estate assets, lead by example to conform to Chapters 6.02 and 9.22 of the Richmond Municipal Code and maximize revenue from City-owned resources, particularly those assigned to enterprise funds.

THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED, that the City Council directs the city manager to prepare and implement a plan for the rehabilitation and adaptive reuse of the four vacant or underutilized historical buildings that will result in meeting the following long-term objectives:

1.    Beneficial occupancy by paying tenants

2.    Positive cash flows that exceed existing cash flows

3.    Opportunities for new jobs, particularly for Richmond residents

4.    Uses consistent with Resolution 129-99, Resolution 46a-00, Goal OSC-E of the General Plan and Policies LU-A.5, CF-K.2, ED-C.3 and OSC-E.2 of the General Plan and the adopted General Management Plan for Rosie the Riveter WW II Home Front National Historical Park and the updated Richmond General Plan.

THEREFORE BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the City Council directs that such plans to include consideration of public-private partnerships, public-public partnerships, grants, tax benefits and other creative incentives to achieve these objectives.

Dry docks an option for cleaning ships

By Thomas Peele

STAFF WRITER
Contra Costa Times

Article Launched: 09/13/2007 03:03:30 AM PDT

For the first time, officials at the U.S. Maritime Administration are strongly considering using dry docks for the underwater hull cleaning of ships in the Suisun Bay Reserve Fleet that are slated to be destroyed, officials said Wednesday.

Putting ships in dry docks to capture metals and organic growth scrapped from the hulls would mark a significant policy change and a concession to state pollution regulators who have been pressuring the administration for more than a year to increase environmental safeguards.

No Maritime Administration ships have been removed from Suisun Bay for disposal since last year as the state has pushed for an environmentally acceptable hull cleaning process. More than 50 obsolete ships in the Mothball Fleet east of the Benicia Bridge are scheduled to be cut up, a process expected to take years.

"I am optimistic that they are hearing the message," Bruce Wolfe, executive officer of the San Francisco Bay Area Water Quality Control Board, said Wednesday.

The administration will "at least put out solicitation for dry dock proposals," Wolfe said at a board meeting Wednesday. Elizabeth Meggison, te administration's chief lawyer, told Wolfe of the development late Tuesday, Wolfe said.

"She asked if that's what we wanted and I said 'yes,'" Wolfe said.

Calls and e-mails to Meggison, Maritime Administrator Sean Connaughton and a spokeswoman were not returned Wednesday. Spokeswoman Susan Clark would only say that the use of dry docks was being considered.

The apparent policy shift came after Wolfe and other state officials expressed disappointment with the test results of a filtering system the administration tried on a ship in Virginia earlier this year.

A "significant amount" of copper was found in the water after the ship was cleaned in the James River, raising doubts that the system would be approved for use in California, where Maritime Administration officials had hoped to use it.

Largely citing costs, the administration has rejected calls for more than a year from environmentalists and state pollution regulators that the ships be cleaned in dry docks rather than while tied up at docks in Alameda and Richmond.

The Bay Area's only working dry docks are in San Francisco. Their owners and city port officials have been lobbying for their use for months.

Maritime consultant Gary Whitney of Petaluma has been pushing to use closed dry docks at the former Mare Island Naval Ship Yard in Vallejo for the work. "We will be submitting proposals," he said Wednesday.

And in Richmond, the City sent a letter to Connaughton in July to express its interest in revitalizing the World War II dry docks at Shipyard No. 3. City Councilman Tom Butt floated the idea a few weeks prior; the Richmond dry docks were used for ship dismantling as recently as the late 1970s.

The ships would be towed into a dry dock, its watertight doors closed and the water pumped out. That would allow workers to clean the vessels of the marine growth and flaking paint. Water would be pumped back in, the doors opened and the ships hauled to Texas.

The administration last year began cleaning the underwater portions of the hulls of ships being readied for towing to Texas for scrapping to comply with a Coast Guard order. The work is designed to stop the spread of marine life such as plants and barnacles to waters where they are not native.

The first ships were cleaned at a dock in Richmond in August 2006. The water board became involved after the Times reported that government documents showed large sheets of metals came off the hulls and were left in the water.

As state regulators pushed for environmental safeguards, Connaughton suspended ship recycling in January. He said the program would start again Aug. 1, but no ships have been removed.

"The Maritime Administration really doesn't have a choice," said Saul Bloom of the San Francisco environmental group Arc Ecology, which monitors the fleet. "The only responsible thing to do is use a dry dock if they want to move ships."

If the ships are cleaned while in the water, the work likely would be done at Maritime Administration docks in Alameda, where officials have grown concerned about possible pollution.

"Dry docking is certainly a superior way of dealing with it," said Leslie Little, that city's development director.

"This is new. Dry docks could provide the kinds of environmental guarantees that everyone in the region is looking for," she said.

Dry docks "have a much greater chance of capturing pollution" than filtering systems do, Wolfe said.

Even if dry docks are used, the Maritime Administration still faces other significant environmental issues with the Suisun fleet.

An environmental assessment of the fleet made public in June showed that more than 21 tons of paint containing toxic metals have fallen from 40 ships into the water. The same report stated that sediment samples taken from the Bay bottom showed high levels of toxic metals.

The water board has ordered further sediment tests and that the administration submit a work plan for how it will clean up the paint on ships that will be anchored in the bay for years. The administration has hired a consultant to study each vessel.

Also, the California State Lands Commission, which leases the administration 1,900 acres on the Bay for the ship anchorage, wants the area cleaned up and pollution free. The state Department of Toxic Substance Control is also investigating, and the Bay Area's congressional delegation and U.S. Sen. Barbara Boxer are pushing for faster ship removal and environmental cleanup.

In another development, officials with the U.S. National Marine Fisheries Service office in the Bay Area sent a letter to the administration last month stating that the pollution from the ships could be a danger to three species of salmon that are listed as threatened species.

Paint falling from the ships is "likely to adversely affect the aquatic life" in the Bay, the letter stated.

Reach Thomas Peele at 925-977-8463 or tpeele@bayareanewsgroup.com.