BELFAST, Maine — City councilors expressed cautious enthusiasm Tuesday night for Front Street Yard’s proposal to expand its footprint on the city waterfront. The caution, councilors explained, was tied to the shipyard’s plan to use city owned land.
The company opened on the waterfront 18 months ago and quickly built five structures, one 55 feet high. Front Street also quickly grew in appeal among boat owners, servicing high-end yachts from around the world. It now employs 97 people.
“We were very busy over the summer,” Front Street president JB Turner told councilors. And as the boating season in New England winds down, all the storage buildings are full, he said.
Earlier in the season, the shipyard encountered customers whose boats were too large to lift out of the water. At the same time, the yard’s current lift doesn’t work well in moving smaller boats from the water.
“We can’t survive on big boats alone,” Turner said.
The solution is to expand by adding a larger lift and constructing another building.
“To create more work and more jobs, we would propose another building,” Turner told councilors.
A larger lift alone, able to lift boats up to 300 metric tons, would not generate enough revenue to pay for itself, he said. The new building would be 140-feet by 160-feet with a ridge height of 61.5 feet.
The expansion would bring 40 more jobs, the company has said.
The company, which occupies waterfront land once owned by Stinson Seafood and some former city land, has little room to add new buildings, Turner said.
Three options emerged: expand an existing building, build on the site of the current Belfast Maskers theater, or — the company’s preferred option — build a new structure on a city-owned parking lot adjacent to the shipyard’s building 4.
“To us, the parking lot makes the most amount of sense,” he said.
In making the pitch for buying or leasing the city-owned lot, Turner noted that 58 of the 97 employees live in Waldo County; the average hourly wage, excluding senior managers, is $19.34 with an annual gross payroll of $4 million; and the company pays 100 percent of the cost of health insurance for employees.
Though he didn’t have exact figures, Turner said the average age of employees is in the late 20s or early 30s.
This year, the company spent $1.5 million with Belfast vendors and another $6 million with other Maine businesses.
In answer to a question from Councilor Eric Sanders, Turner said Front Street has been able to weather the slow economy well. In 2007, boat-building was at “full force,” but once the recession began, construction slowed.
“Instead of paying $18 million for a new boat, they pay $5 million [for a used boat] and put $5 million into it to make it their way,” he said. “If you can do both,” build and retrofit, “it’s a win-win.”
The shipyard has had one yacht in its shop for nearly a year and the owner will pay almost $5 million for the retrofit, Turner said.
Councilors told Turner they were thrilled the company was formed in Belfast, and stressed that it was easy to work with Front Street officials on the contract zoning arrangement that allowed the company to build here.
“This is a great problem to have,” Councilor Mike Hurley said of the need for expansion. But considering changing the status of the city-owned parking lot and the city-owned Maskers theater were big issues.
“Act in haste, repent at leisure,” he said, and noted that decades ago, two city streets were given to private interests in the name of economic development by “the geniuses who sat here,” referring to the council chambers.
But Hurley sounded a conciliatory note: “One way or another, we’ll figure a way to work it out,” he said.
Sanders said there was some concern in the city that the company could grow so large as to change the character of the community.
Councilor Mary Mortier echoed that view, saying that she has been stopped in public by residents who have expressed their concerns about the loss of city property.
Speaking on behalf of the shipyard’s expansion earlier in the meeting, former harbor committee member Mike Stein said that the small parking lot the company wants to buy or lease was built to accommodate the Belfast & Moosehead Lake Railroad which, in the mid 1990s was running an excursion boat from the city-owned Thompson’s wharf. That business no longer exists, he said.
Resident Joanne Boynton, who described herself as a “great fan of the shipyard,” said allowing it “to grow so large that it would dominate the waterfront would be a big mistake.”
City Planner Wayne Marshall said the company’s application to add a new lift would work its way through the harbor committee, planning board and council, with public hearings at each step. If the council agrees to lease or sell land, the application to build also will be heard by city committees.
Hmm, let’s see, give up a parking lot that generally gets little use and a decrepit old building that also gets little use in exchange for more good paying jobs with health benefits? What is there to think about, really? These councillors are the same people that think it’s a great idea to waste a million dollars on building a sidewalk and another two hundred grand on some old railroad tracks that no one wants….and Hurley has the nerve to refer to “the geniuses” that once sat there? Wise up; scrap the sidewalk and rr track plan and give the go ahead for this expansion. There is no down side.
Hooray for Front Street! As a small boat owner who uses the yard, I heartily endorse their endeavors. The staff is professional and they know their stuff. The mechanic who works on my 26′ boat gave me his cell number and told me to call anytime if I had a problem. I took him up on his offer one Sunday night and he came right down and fixed the problem. AMAZING customer service.
Front Street Shipyard made hell sparkle, they are professional and spot
on. Here’s some more waste and abuse from my blog
http://www.belfastbullies.blogspot.com 12/6/12 My Post in Republican Journal
Today for Belfast Christmas Tree Lighting- copied to all Council, Mayor
and press
Posted by: Laurie Lee Allen
| Dec 06, 2012 07:53
Mr Mayor, Tear Down That City Hall Wall. See more @
http://www.belfastbullies.blogspot.com Can’t count on DEP, they
destroy the very wetlands they are bound to protect then force
astronomical cost to resident to fix via Wetlands Stabilization Permit
By Rule- 85k for what they allowed the City to do (to an extent, some
unapproved to which DEP is to cover up also). The web of
corruption…looks so pretty, come, come buy this web….don’t be
scared, you can trust me, there is no secret city stormwater nightmare
running through your property. Yes, yes, heal here from a brutal divorce
that crushed you and your children… paying cash??? oh that’s even
better, you’ll never get out, welcome to Hotel Seaview Terrace.
Posted by: Laurie Lee Allen
| Dec 06, 2012 06:47
So lovely is Belfast.
After all the hell City Hall and Town and Country Realtors has forced on me, I protest on High St. to make others aware of the evil below the surface, spreading like cancer. No one wants to see this, you don’t want to believe its happening. It is
but can be stopped with vigilance and forcing Council to act. I have
proved corruption beyond doubt. Hiding and with holding specific
requests of public documents by City Planning is top of
the crimes. Although I have proved the forced flooding and destruction
to Seaview Terrace on my own, through 2 years of City beating, realtor
and Hall alike, they think that I will eventually break down, mentally
and financially. No, I get stronger. Watching Dr. Morrell,(as Mayor Ash
said in the 12/4/12 meeting “An innocent bystander” to protect her
property from Plannings mistakes is wrong, wrong, wrong. Planning/Zoning were
plowing ahead at great speed to cheaply and hazardously correct the
zoning violation to rid their hands of the mess the Planning Office
consistently creates to residents. Code Officer, Todd Rosenburg was
forceful in his prior presentation that his plan would not flood Dr.
Morrow, and that HE was the Council’s expert and they should have faith
in him. To which Council Roger Lee gave allegiance. Forcing the
resident
to hire experts and threaten legal actions. Next meeting, Rosenburg’s
expert plan, months in the making, with our tax dollars and our tax
dollars to
fix their incompetence, was as clear as the resident said. Her property
would be flooded by his plan but The City Wall Hall was going to bull
doze over her anyway. The cost of attorney’s and engineers, then to
escalate waiting for Council to get to the agenda, it’s outrageous and
outrageous that it is accepted by residents. So that’s they way it works
with Planning, if you can’t stop them before, they will ruin your life
trying to get it fixed after. Tactics used against me include calling me
in as a threat to the
Chief of Police, ordering City employees not to help me, Planning
refusing to provide documents and when forced, produces everything but
the real seal, hiding maps, with holding specific to my home 1987
engineer reports flooding to Seaview Terrace getting worse where was dry
since 1967, hiding the original plans proving what I said from the
start, the stream is man-made and City Manager knew it but kept voicing
natural, City Wall refusing to honor at evidence and pictures taken
with Bob Whitely, Tax Assessor (he was stunned and speechless) police
presence at meetings to whisk me away for one wrong word, bringing in
the City Attorney to speak for them and run from me when questioned, City
Attorney sending letters of intimidation, Mike Hurley publicly
slandering me, Joe Slocum and Wayne Marshall publicly discrediting me,
lying to me, attempting neighbor alienation through selective private
property assistance from DPW and lying over and over about that,
covering, covering, covering. Council awards them raises, enforcing the
brutal treatment to ‘INNOCENT RESIDENTS’. SAVE BELFAST FROM THE CITY
WALL
HALL- COUNCIL DO YOUR JOB, SERVE THE PEOPLE. YOU ARE JUST GETTING A
TASTE OF WHAT’S COMING DOWN THE PIKE FROM THE WALL OF ABUSING POWER
REALTORS HAVE TO DECEIVE TO SELL BECAUSE OF THE
HORROR OF PLANNING. I WILL NOT ALLOW THIS AND WILL KEEP FIGHTING BACK.
BELFAST IS SO WORTH IT, IT IS A DREAM INTERRUPTED BY A NIGHTMARE.
Laurie Allen, 17 Seaview Terrace, Belfast