I, of course, am talking about Mayor Finch and his cronies in Bridgeport Harbor who just this week have threatened seizure of our private property on September 19th at 3PM including our 60' public access dock in downtown Bridgeport as well as our fleet of registered and completely legal vessels saying they are "abandoned".
In an email I received from Bill Coleman, economic officer for the City of Bridgeport, he states "I will request of the Bridgeport Harbor Master and the Bridgeport Police Department that CCB’s vessels and structures be removed from the premises. As per the law, I will notify you as to the storage location of the vessels and structures. If you are not able to collect the vessels and structures, I will, again per the law, request that the City Attorney’s Office arrange for the sale of the vessels and structures."
Connecticut law grants the Bridgeport Harbor Master (Tony Palumbo) authority to seize all vessels that pose risk to safe navigation, but as our vessels are legally docked on a float we legally permitted through the DEEP and Army Corp of Engineers, paid for using private funds, and have sailed from all season long, we can't begin to understand how the City could possibly lay claim to our fleet and facility at this time.
Coleman goes on to claim in his email, that CCB is not in compliance with an access agreement they granted us in 2012 that expired Jan 1 of this year. Unfortunately it has taken until SEPTEMBER for them to realize that they failed to renew their "permission" for us to access the water. We learned only after signing that agreement in 2012 that the City doesn't even own the pier from which we access the water and that it is patrolled by New York Police and owned by the Connecticut DOT. Now the City is using a fraudulent expired agreement that allowed us access to the water to begin building a dock that we have now built and finished, to now take the fruit of that labor and hand a cash strapped charity working to do good in our community a bill for the privilege.
The real losers in all this will not be CCB, but instead thousands of children and families who we had hoped to build this facility for so that everyone could enjoy a day on the water regardless of income or residency- Apparently Mayor Finch and the City elites, don't agree.
So as good sailors we will do what countless generations of sailors have done before in the face of piracy, stand and fight. This week, we will seek legal retribution in Court as we hope to stop the assault on our facility before the City even sets sail. Following that we hope to garner the support of our community and seek reparations for the near year of economic losses and the cost of a facility we have never been able to fully use due to the assault of bureaucrats while this battle has been in the offing. And as a fall back position, we hope to find the funding to file a law suit on behalf of the thousands of kids who have gotten the shaft by the Mayor of Bridgeport when he failed to follow State Statute by failing to allow us to create a public access point to the water at the Train Station in Downtown Bridgeport.
"Sec. 15-12. Obstructions upon lands bordering navigable waters. The selectmen of any town bordering upon navigable waters shall cause to be removed all obstructions and structures from the shores, beaches or other land in such town, adjacent to such waters, to which shores, beaches or other land the public has the right of access or which the public has been accustomed to use, occupy or enjoy, unless such obstruction or structure has been erected or maintained by, or by the express or implied permission of, the person having title to the land on which it has been so erected or maintained or having a legal right to erect and maintain it thereon; and such selectmen may, in the name of the town, have equitable relief by way of injunction against any person who, without legal right, interferes with the use and enjoyment of such shores, beaches and lands by the public or attempts to exercise any exclusive possession or use of any part thereof."
Attached you find a letter I have mailed to the DEEP today informing them of this situation and why it will now be impossible for us to comply with their request for us to leave Connecticut waters due to our completely legal, USCG inspected and registered Floating Boat House as we begin this fight for open access to the waters of Bridgeport Harbor.
The day has come when it is time to stand up for the people of Connecticut and the waters of Long Island Sound. I hope you will stand with me as CCB takes aim to make our State into a place we can be proud to call home.
Thank you.
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