Harbor View Marina Renters Scram Early, State Asks City to Take Over

Be prepared to subsidize another marina. 

Around 60 years ago, private marinas sprung up in Ludington's harbor, nestled or near the Pere Marquette Lake Bayou.  The success of these ventures led to the city considering it's own public marina as early as 1958, which was realized a little over 20 years thereafter with federal and state funds.  They managed that while the Michigan Waterways Commission decided they would construct another publicly-funded boat parking lot, the Harbor View Marina, opening in April 1998.  

The private marinas have definitely suffered from the public competition, especially when the City has openly violated provisions of their public lease by allowing charter boats, commercial enterprises, within them.  Yet, Harbor View was dubbed a public-private partnership, where the State maintained ownership of the facility, and had a private management firm take over for what was to be a 25 year lease, ending in 2023.  

But just like a car leaser who sees a lot of deferred maintenance needing to be done to keep the ol' car running and who quits the lease early, the management firm decided it wanted only 20 years of that lease.  Guess who will need to rebuild that facility now?  All those taxpayers in Ludington and the State, a sizable majority that have no boat or that would have any inclination to store it at Harbor View Marina if they did.

At a recent Finance Committee meeting on October 11, our city's marina manager, Jim Christiansen, noted that the DNR has learned a hard lesson here and at other places this has been tried and that they do not want to be in the private marina leasing business anymore.  It was noted that when the lease began there was no upkeep and the private firm's numbers were good. They are at the point that this is no longer a money making adventure for them.  It was further explained:

"A few weeks back the State of Michigan DNR approached the City regarding Harbor View Marina. The current lessees have a lease through 2024 and they are ready to get out of it. The DNR asked about a possibility of the City taking over that facility. The DNR wants no competition with the Ludington Municipal Marina. Harbor View Marina has issues that need to be fixed. It is a 19-year-old marina. [Ludington City Manager] Brock stated that the lease agreement is fairly weak and allows the current lessees to practically just walk away if they choose to. The DNR has all but assured us of financial help in the form of a grant with our docks at the Municipal Marina. The DNR is aware that the Harbor View Marina building, pool and sidewalk, as well as the docks, need repair. The State would rather us take over the lease sooner than later, but in reality we think we need a year to take this over to work with their current boaters, staff and managers." 

More details and deliberations are in that meeting's notes.  In the council packet for the October 22 meeting, there is nothing explaining the follow resolution in any way.  

It seems this is a rather perverse scheme where the State's DNR entices our city leaders into taking on a money pit at the Harbor View Marina, under the quid pro quo of a generous grant to fix the docks in the City's current marina.  These city officials, perhaps naively, believe that the State will also be supplying the funds for renovating Harbor View, since the State has already paid millions to maintain and improve the existing Ludington City Marina over its 30+ years of existence.  

Long story short, these publicly built and owned facilities are not sustainable.  The City relies on the Michigan Waterways Commission for supplemental funds when it's in trouble, the Michigan Waterways Commission will grab more money from their coffers and the DNR's in order to maintain Harbor View.  Millions and millions will be spent while private marinas nearby have struggled against the unfair competition for nearly four decades, stubbornly surviving despite the unlevel playing field. 

Perhaps the time has come to consider selling the public marinas, since 99%+ of us in the public either cannot or do not ever use them, they are repellant to free market marinas, and they just can't figure out why the Harbor View experiment was doomed to failure.

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This is EXACTLY why the city turned their back on the trouble around the Bayou and spent the money elsewhere! What is funny/odd is that the 2 main culprits, Shay and Krauch packed up and left town! If Schuette had the public in mind these guys may have been held accountable! But it is Schuette , sadly!

I had always heard that this lease for Harbor View was for only the first 20 years, not 25, but that's window dressing. The fact is, this whole lease of a DNR/State owned and financed marina was the first of it's nature ever tried, no other had ever been implemented nor financed in this degree. The key leasee is Bob Manglitz, LMC owner also.Yes, it was bad enough to have to compete with the Municipal, but then the much fancier and brand new 1998 Harbor View, was totally devastating to private marinas. If we had any smart city officials, they would sell the Harbor View and use the funds to fix our very deteriorated infrastructure, but, I can't see that ever happening. The city would like to own every square foot of the entire city waterfront, and has for many years, without paying fair market value also.

Alas, the City cannot sell HV Marina if they are a leaser, only the State can do that, likewise I'm sure the State would have to OK any selling of the City Marina since they have invested millions and millions of $$$ in it over the years.  They ain't likely going to do that anytime soon, because it will affirm what I and others have said all along, and yet they refuse to admit it.  The Ludington City Marina and Harbor View are unsustainable without myriads of state subsidization floating in.  

Such arrangements aren't so bad if we are talking about parks and recreational areas, but this is a public marina, whose stated purpose is to be a harbor of refuge in a city which already had such facilities already ran by the private sector, and were still growing.  People not only need a recreational water vessel but a hoard of extra money to stay in these public facilities, decked out with all the amenities due to the generosity of the taxpayers.

Thanks for the legal clarifications X. And your statements about investments of many many $$Millions is also on key, which no private facilities could ever afford. If our local infrastructure in ruins is any example of how the COL intends to maintain HV into the future, then it certainly is destined to go into ruins also.

True Aquaman, HV may go into ruin following the history of Ludington's infrastructure, unless the locals taxes go up which in effect will subsidize HV even more. There should be some sort recreational usage tax on users only on Harbor view.

Ludington leaders are going under the presumption that not only will the State DNR/Waterways Commission bail them out with over a million to replace the city marina docks, but also will have the DNR/WC come through via other million dollar grants over time to cover the cost of renovating HV Marina because of their 'pride of ownership'.  What a slap in the face of the small business owners around the PM Lake who can't get millions of subsidies from the government, what a slap in the face to the taxpayers of Michigan who are paying for it all and getting nothing out of it.

Big slaps in the faces of local private marina owners is a standard operating procedure for Ludington officials, always has been. But, if the local taxpayers find out upping taxes in the future is going to help HV with maintenance needs, there may be other repurcusions on them, and recalls of the city council members favoring it.

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