Chapter 8
I was asked by a local Bridgeport resident to explain how we got to this state of affairs at CCB with the City. Bridgeport would have you believe as one Bridgeport official puts it that this is a "another well orchestrated tantrum of 'whoa is me'".
Ok maybe we are doing a bit of "woe is me". Considering we paid $35,000 to build a facility and were ordered, complete with veiled threats of violence, to move our boats out of the THEIR harbor, before we ever completed the facility or been allowed to put one season of operation in, I think we are entitled.
But it didn't start with the order in March to remove our boats from the moorings. It didn't start with the DEEP Notice of Violation about our boat house. It started well before that when things went south in Seaside Park and they have only gotten worse from there.
I met Bill Coleman on a tour of Bridgeport Harbor aboard the Harbor Masters boat back in late 2010. I explained to him then that we had been forced to shut down due to a massive increase in park fees and a complete breakdown of dealings with the Charlie Carrol. Mr. Carrol didn't like me, it was clear, but the $130 per season parking fee every out of town student and member was being asked to pay was the last straw at Seaside Park. At the end of 2010, I called it quits there in the hopes that I could get our ship back on course to open Bridgeport Harbor, which was my original idea when starting CCB.
We began dealings with Bill Coleman almost immediately to obtain permission to move to downtown Bridgeport for the 2011 summer season. We did clean ups, sent letters, fundraised and fully prepared to try and open the Bridgeport Boat Basin in 2011. We waited in January, February, March, April, May and June to get the ok to start work, but when July rolled around, it really was too late to do anything. Then Irene slammed into the North East, the Halloween Blizzard crippled the Northern part of CT and before you knew it, Christmas, New Years and 2012 was here- another wasted year trying to make this happen. But I have been working since 2006 to try and make Bridgeport a better place to live, what is one more year- right?
At the start of 2012, CCB was still trying to recover from a fundraiser failure at Black Rock Yacht Club, where some good meaning people racked up a giant drink bill and left CCB to cover it after they failed to raise the funds they assured us they would raise. That debacle left us with a load of debt, still no revenue and a Board who had decided that now the hard work was over, they would let me go as the Executive Director because of my sunshiny personality and do things themselves, namely have drinking parties aboard our fleet with the closed sign on the front gate. We had a big shake up in early 2012 on the CCB Board and when the smoke cleared, we had a half dozen board members all set and prepared to move CCB out of Bridgeport.
My critical mistake was convincing my board to make one last go at the Bridgeport Boat Basin and I overruled their decision and started the process again to get the Mayor's office to initiate an agreement to use Bridgeport Harbor.
In January 2012, I started the calls again. Sometime around then I got a call from Pete Holecz, Harbor Commission chair. Pete has always been a fair guy in my estimation and if you need to know the inside scoop on Bridgeport politics, he is the guy to talk to. Pete called me at 730 in the morning, as he often did, to tell me I had to shut my mouth when it comes to bad mouthing Bridgeport. Taken aback that he was in on the whisper campaign of "Chris German is a hot headed loud mouth who hates Bridgeport", I asked Pete if he could give me an example of one way I have ever bad mouthed the City I love so dearly. He could not, but warned me if I didn't shut up, things would not go my way.
Im still not sure what I said that got under the skin of so many in Bridgeport. I know I wrote a facebook post about the Connecticut Post article that stated raw sewage was dumped into Black Rock harbor 40 times in 2009 that ruffled a few feathers. I also know I have no friend in Charlie Carrol, and quite frankly he's the guy to know if you want to do anything in Bridgport, so I am guessing that's where it all came from. But it gelled for me when I saw Judge Carmen Lopez's Op Ed in the paper on May 29, of this year that I felt vindicated. Almost a Birthday Present for me!
In it she explains that "When legitimate concerns and complaints are raised, the entrenched political and economic powers in our city are quick to demonize opponents. The machinery to produce a whisper campaign of deceit, innuendos and half-truths is immediately put into action."
When I read that piece I said with my hot head and my loud mouth, "BRILLIANT". That is exactly what is going on here and someone had the guts to say it. It helps that she is a judge and kind of protected from the mess downtown, but all the same she said it- That was awesome.
So back to early 2012. After three months of back and forth, more than a few tense moments with Bill Coleman, we somehow had a summit of sorts. Me, Bill Coleman, Bill Finch, Adam Wood and Charlie Carroll all sat down in City Hall Annex to see if there was a way to make me happy. I started by explaining the parking issue at Seaside and Charlie said, "Well why didn't you tell me, you can come in the park free of charge?" I don't think he understood that it is isn't about me, the public was being price gouged to use the waters of Long island Sound and that was wrong. In either case, I thanked him and we moved on to the real point of the meeting- how to open Bridgeport Harbor.
The Mayor got real serious with me and looked me strait in the eye. He said, "Chris, people don't like you. They think you say bad things about the City and I am inclined to agree. I had to pull in all kinds of favors to get you your agreement. But I need you to promise me, you will shut up. I need you to be part of the team, I need you to keep the higher ups in this City happy. Cause if you don't, we'll get you." I was a little scared I have to admit, but I sheepishly agreed and we were off.
On March 26, 2013, I got a very one sided lease agreement from the City to sign that said we could access the water for the purpose of building a community boating program. Every lawyer I have talked to about this says I was a fool for signing it, but what no one seems to realize, this is not about me, it is about the public, its about the kids, its about others- so if it hurts me a little and there is nothing in it for me, so be it, it does what it needs to do, open Bridgeport Harbor for all.
And that April we began work. I bought a 17' Wellcraft from Hitchcock Marine in Stratford. I needed it because I had to drive down to Darien to get the docks that would become the base of the Bridgeport Boat Basin. If you missed the 18-hour adventure on Facebook, there are lots of photos, but invariably, that long at sea with only a bird to talk to killed a few brain cells in me. I did have one visitor that day. Tha harbor master drove a half an hour down to Norwalk to say hello to me. When I asked him to grab a line and give me a hand towing it back to Bridgeport he said no and drove away. Ten hours later I pulled in Black Rock Harbor. I had no place to store the docks, no place to park the boat or any other shore support- the City wouldn't let me use the abandoned properties off Direktor or Pequonnock, but by hook or by crook, I got the docks, and things started to happen. By Labor Day it was done for the most part.
Around that time Bass Pro announced they were thinking about coming to Bridgeport and I was chatting about that with my friends in Stratford who used to own that site until the City took it 30 years ago. They said they were invited to the event the Mayor was holding to announce the site. I told them that was great, we'd love a new neighbor in Bridgeport Harbor. He said, "Chris, your not going to be there" I said, "What do you mean?" He said that he was well sourced in the City and that he had heard a plot was afoot to seize our facility from CCB once we were done so that they could use it for themselves. That point was born out in a later conversation John had with Bill Colemen where he said, "We're not sure what we'll do with your stuff, probably open up transient moorings there when your gone". The short of it, the day I signed that access agreement was the day the City stared planning on ways to take it over.
When I heard that I knew I needed to go big or go home. Just because your paranoid, doesn't mean your wrong. I told this to the board and we all decided that we needed a way to move in a hurry because when the order came, there would be no "you have six months to leave", it would be, "get out in two weeks or were taking it all". Guess what happened last week?
Chapter 9
This is when we came up with the idea for the floating boat house. As long as we were stuck to shore, we couldn't avoid the eventual take over. Our storage container at Seaside, our fleet on the hard in the Landfill, all of that was at risk. And when theives broke in and stole $150,000 of tools, gear and materials from us, we realized, floating was probably the best answer of all. That idea got even more support in Hurricane Sandy.
When the storm was predicted to make landfall in the NYC area, I knew we had some vulnerabilities. Our docks, our vessels, our ramp all were vulnerable to wind and seas. Our only hope was that the Boat Basin was protected enough to withstand such a blow. However, with 30 feet of water to anchor through in the Boat Basin, storm surge could make things a bit dicey. We moved Jumbo up river to the old dolphins off the Sliver by the River. We moored all vessels with double bridals, stripped sails and pumped everything dry. We filled the rainbows with water and sunk them at the dock. The added weight of the water would give our dock more inertia and the vessels would not be bashed against the rails submerged. It had to work.
We took up position in the Holiday Inn that Friday night and awaited the winds.
Around 10 PM Friday, the winds had picked up. The tide was high and splashing over the planks at the Ferry terminal. The fleet was riding nicely and docks were holding fast. We would be ok if this was as bad as it would get. By Saturday morning the wind had freshened to a steady 35 and the tide was going up again. Unfortunately, the projected winds from the Southeast were not materializing, but instead they blew a steady northeast and our boats were pointing the wrong way. One by one as the tide grew higher the moorings failed. Boats drifted and all seemed to be going wrong.
We went out there at 3PM, lashed the fleet as a giant pile and hoped for the best. We continued to check on it every hour after that, but by 6PM the winds were topping out at 50 and the tide had not fallen. We couldn't see Jumbo, but knew she had tug boat lines attached to dolphins that were designed to hold a Staten Island Ferry. She'd be ok. But the rest of the fleet was in peril. After the boats drifted, the storm surge was our next worry. The ramp was not designed to go above 10 feet and we had no idea what the mooring lines would do when the docks lifted that high. And then the lights went out.
We tried to go out again at 7PM but parts of the roof were blowing down the street at 60 miles an hour. Giant sheets of metal flew through the air like paper, but if met by the human body would slice like a Ginsu knife through a tomato. We walked out the front door of the hotel, and wandered a few feet down the block, but water was clearly rising over the street and the winds were rattling the electric lines above the train station. Giant blue arcs filled the air and in the distance the skyline glowed over Stratford where we were sure a fire was raging. It was not fit for man nor beast outside and it's never worth dying for a boat. We settled in with the rest of the patrons of the hotel huddled around a single surge protector with cell phones.
By 11PM the winds had abated. We went out to Water Street and saw a news crew from Canada standing by our dock. We went to the reporter to chat, but were quickly distracted by the river surging under the train tracks. Eight feet of water poured over the rails of the pier and all lights were out. The doors at the train station were locked and we could not get in to get high enough to review the fleet and docks. What was happening? How did we do? Realizing nothing would be known until the tide dropped and the sun came up the next morning, we went to bed for a few hours.
I woke at 6AM and went down to the docks, the tide was retreating and our fleet was still piled up around the moorings. I rushed down to see the docks and ramp and it was clear that water had covered them. 1000 pounds of sticks, grass and trash were piled on our ramp and docks, but the rainbows had done their job. It was all still there. Everything floated up with the tide, the moorings lost contact with the ground, but it all settled back down when the tide went out.
Jumbo didn't even have grass on her decks. She rode out the storm like a champ and their wasn't even a chaffe mark on her gunnels. The old adage, "The Tree that Bends Doesn't Break" The things we did to work with the storm worked beautifully, the things we did to fight the storm failed miserably. Lesson learned, float don't fight. A floating boat house was the way to go.
And so in November we started building.
Chapter 10
When designing a floating boat house, we had a bunch of things to consider. What could we do with it? How would we move it? Where would we source the materials? The one question we didn't consider was who would permit it. Sue Jacobson of the DEEP told us a long while back that such a project would never be permitted in the State and that if we tried to appeal her decision, we would never get a permit issued to us in this State ever again. So when I heard that, I knew what every plan I suggested to the board would have to be one that could circumvent the obstacles and supersede the State regulation of our waterways. Who would give us the green light to move forward? Certainly not the DEEP, but how about any other regulatory officials? Believe it or not if you get into trouble on Long Island Sound, the DEEP is the last to show up. The first will be the US Coast Guard. They also regulate all commercial traffic, maintain navigational aids and issue permits to build vessels in Connecticut and in the United States. And if you have to piss someone off, I always recommend avoiding the ones with guns.
As it is always better to beg forgiveness than ask permission, we began building to see how our State and City regulators would react. At first, I got a nasty email from Pete Holecz asking me what the hell I thought I was doing. That Boat House wasn't on the permit for the DEEP, where did I get the permission to do so. I explained we were building a boat and required no State or local permits. Radio silence took over for a while and I hoped that would be it.
We put up the first floor classroom walls and quickly moved onto the shop bay. The overheads for the office could be a standard eight feet, but the bay overheads would have to allow us to hoist a boat. Our idea was this shop could be used to build boats as our small boat fleet was stolen and the Pequonnock river was perfect for row boats. If we built our fleet this time rather than buy it, we would save a ton of money, could build anything we desired into the vessels and could involve the community in building our fleet. All we needed was the facility to start.
John got involved in the design and several of our volunteers were concerned about how we would anchor the superstructure to the dock. You can't fasten to concrete. Instead one of our volunteers came up with the idea to use industrial 3/4 inch J-bolts and lash the structure to the deck. We had to rent a hammer drill to create the anchor points and the big worry was as we lowered the walls down onto the bolts, someone had to hold the j-bolt with their hand- I saw finger juice squirting out of the seems in the deck. We sunk 18 of these bolts without so much as blister. But when I was being a stupid masculine ass showing another female how to toenail a corner, I smashed my finger and lost the nail. I hate being a guy sometimes.
The first floor framing completed shortly before Christmas- the snow was about to fly and I hoped we could at least get some shelter for the winter. We sail all year round at CCB and a spot to warm up would be nice. We got word that a blizzard would be coming shortly after the new year and without the funds to put all the plywood up, I had to go back to fundraising. That was when the political storm kicked up.
In February, I received a letter from the Harbor Master stating that I was (personally) to remove all of MY vessels from the moorings in Bridgeport Harbor. First off, I have been boating in Bridgeport since I was a kid and I have never heard of them enforcing the rule that boats had to be removed in winter. I wonder what whalers did in 1870 when they came to Bridgeport? Does the Port Jeff Ferry have to close up shop in winter? No that's how they make a living. This is how I make a living- what's the difference? Besides that, It was the last week in February and the new season started March 1. What was the point? But most importantly, THE BOATS WEREN'T MINE.
Although I feed myself with CCB, I no more own CCB than I own City hall. I am the executive director and while I have a greater voice than most in the board room, the boats are community property and open to all to use. I tried to explain that concept to the Harbor Master, but Tony Palumbo never quite got it. Instead, he ran around taking pictures of me, the fleet and the facilities to use against me and discredit me in the next Harbor Commission meeting. Knowing I would receive no welcome at any more Harbor Commission Meetings in January and after receiving several threats of violence and injury at the hands of some of the drug addicts I kicked out of CCB, I had informed the Board that I would no longer represent CCB in Bridgeport and that a replacement representative must be found. John Madden stepped up- He's a good man.
John told me about the photos and told me that the harbor master stated when he presented them to him that he had had no idea John would be coming to the meeting and that it was never intended to be seen by him, rather it was designed as The Harbor Master put it, "To Get Chris German." I thought that statement pretty much summed up my point.
And so John began working with the City to become compliant with their complaints. He moved the boats to the only place we could find, our dock. He cleaned up the landfill and removed all the items that were still somewhat serviceable despite three years of theft, vandalism and neglect. (Bridgeport refused to lock the gates at the Landfill for more than two years resulting in the majority of the thefts. Their thought: If we cant get them to quit, maybe the wildlife will). He also started regularly attending Harbor Commission meetings so that John could keep the Harbor Commission apprised of our progress. John reported to the Harbor Commission in May that all items were clean and that we had complied. Jeff Burr, a consistently condescending and particularly contrary member of the Commission, attacked John complaining about the "Mess we left in Bridgeport" The Harbor Master to his credit rebuffed Mr. Burr saying that CCB had done a masterful job in complying and that Mr. Burr's complaints were unfounded.
John walked away from that meeting with the full understanding that there would be no way we could comply with the City as they were not to be satisfied with anything other than the full removal of me from the planet.
We began our efforts to find ways to raise the money to remove our facility and get out of Bridgeport knowing that as long as this administration pursued us, we would have no success in Bridgeport. And so we tried to go to Groton. We asked the Mayor of Groton if we could move there. She agreed enthusiastically at first, but when I referred her to speak to Bill Coleman (who I thought at that time was fair, even if he wasn't a friend) she mysteriously did a 180 and stopped returning calls. We then decided to try and build a school ship for our State, thinking that if we cant have a floating classroom, at least we can educate kids on the waves. I met with Sen Andy Maynard, State Senate Minority leader, about a State loan/grant package to fund the purchase of the "Mystic". On Sunday morning we met aboard the "Mystic" in Mystic with a couple of local volunteers from Mystic. Sen Maynard almost burst a seam when he heard our plan and said he would be calling me the next day to arrange to have me make a presentation to the State Senate. Mysteriously once again, after he made a few calls to his colleagues the line went dead.
Chapter 11
Every attempt we made to find a new Harbor in Connecticut started strong, but died a quiet death. That was when we decided that in order to save our investment, maybe it was best to go to another State. After all Manhattan Sailing Club has a floating boat house and MIT has a floating boat house. But New York City and Boston both have one thing going for them that Bridgeport doesn't, they are not in Connecticut.
So on a cloudy spring morning in late May, John and his son and I, hopped in the car and headed to Brooklyn. Rumors abounded on the web that a crazy beatnik had built a floating home in the Gowanus Canal. Naked ladies were rumored to sun bath in full view of the Long Island Expressway and late night parties complete with bongos and hashish were rumored to fill the night air. I had also seen some house boats the week before when we were delivering a 35' motor yacht from NJ to CT. NYC is not my cup of tea, but if they give us safe harbor away from the attacks of the DEEP and Bridgeport so be it. We set out to find the hidden underworld of water-born beatniks in the East River.
We found where they were. By accident, we swung down an empty, scary side street that we knew by satellite adjoined the Gowanus Canal, but otherwise had no obvious connection to the sea. Strange that despite being an Island, so much of NYC is so removed from the water? But sure enough, in the heart of the hood, at the end of what looks like the Gambino dumping ground, on a poisoned, forgotten superfund site in the middle of Brooklyn, we found ...the Gowanus Canal Canoe Club.
There we met a lovely young lady who offered us a paddle and a chance to explore the storied Gowanus Canal. She said that in it's former years the site was a real pit, but in recent years the water quality has improved and that they are working to make it better. By allowing folks to explore the waters of the Gowanus by Canoe, they are creating new stakeholders to help motivate tax payers to fix this small but intensely abused piece of the world. She said that every once in a while now you could see a fish swimming and that it hadn't caught on fire for years. We declined the offer not because the water was dirty, but we were in street clothes on a mission.
We asked her if she knew about the House Boat people and she said she knew them well. Apparently this young man was well liked, although not the most reliable. Only the Lord truly knew where he was now. The last she had heard, the guy was with some of the others living in Queens after Sandy had torn up the docks there. They got free docking cause the federal funding was taking forever and the owner couldn't afford to fix to reopen.
It was a lead we thought, thanked her profusely for the info, accepted a stack of informational place mats that gave visitors a walking tour of Gowanus superfund sites, and made our way for Flushing Meadows where I knew I had seen house boats before.
We drove past the US Tennis Center, the World Fair sites, we saw the damage left over from Sandy and visited some post apocalyptic parking lots that abutted the water. No where could we find the boat people in Queens. But we did kill our suspension system and get a better understanding of why Queens is not the place to live.
That was when we called Chris, the Guy with the Chickens in Bridgeport. He hangs out down there all the time and knows all the people who walk to their own tune. Chris said he thought he had heard of a yard in the Bronx that allowed boaters to live aboard and house boats to park. The difference between a house boat and boat house is simple- one you live in, one you work in. But for this purpose, we didn't think it mattered.
Hopping on the Cross Bronx, driving past the Home of the Evil Empire, we noodled our way to a yard on the upper reaches of the East River. It was better than Queens, but still not the place I wanted to call home. But if we had to go there, we had to go and life has a funny way of getting acceptable with enough time, so maybe that would happen here.
We GPS'd the East River and began following every nook and every cranny up towards Connecticut. We stopped in Walmart Parking lots, we hung our heads over over passes craning our necks to look up and down the channel to see if we could see anything that looked right. And then there it was, out of no where, we saw the first. It had geraniums in the windows and a garden hose neatly coiled next to a lawn chair. The paint was fresh and if you didn't know it was floating, you would think you were in Fairfield. Looking further down, a row of various shaped house boats, all equally well maintained, lined the canal. But this was all hidden from view behind a chain link fence and a four lane boulevard lined with car stereo installation shops.
A guy about my age was doing work on a sail boat parked next to the floating home. I called to him, but whether it was the din of traffic or the ears of a New Yorker, he could not hear me. Just then an older guy with a chow locker the size of a small VW poked his head out of the house boat. I called, "Hello Sir" He looked up with a scowl. I said, " How do I get in touch with someone here about parking my boat house?" He snarled back, "Read the freakin' sign". I said, "What sign?" "The one on the fucking wall". I said thank you and waved politely.
The sign was tucked between a spanish speaking law firm and bail bonds office. It said "XYZ Marina" Im not going to tell you where this is because apparently New York although much more decent about regulation, doesn't like the fact that these people live on their boats. I don't want to call them out here despite Joey Bag-Of_Donuts' pleasant demeanor. What I will tell you though is as we looked inside the yard, a faded white van was parked with a flat tire. On its side advertised for a security company and you'll never guess where it was from: Bridgeport. Irony.
We drove home not defeated, but a bit discouraged, what we were looking for was not another fight, just a place to finish building our boat house to put to sea. While with enough graft and persistent enough effort, we could likely get a spot in the Bronx to park, the cost, time and smell were not worth the effort. Lets see what the DEEP says, we pondered, but its an option.
Chapter 12
When I returned home I sent an email to Sue Jacobson asking her for a chance to sit in mediation to see if we could devise a plan to let us finish the boat house and then we were sure we could find an organization in NYC or Boston who would want it. After all, it would be self contained, fully off grid, completely registered and legal by USCG standards. We even had plans to install a tidal electric generator between the pontoons that would be the first of of its kind after our engineering friends at University of Bridgeport designed it. That was a hell of lot better than the beatniks who dumped their sewage over board and built their's from rail road yard scraps. We just needed the summer to finish and could be out of the State, quietly, by Labor Day.
Sue responded with an email saying incredulously that she had been trying to reach us for weeks! She said that yes mediation could work and asked me to suggest a few dates. As I have been living and breathing this thing for the last 7 years, did a date really matter? I explained to her that I would come any time, any day, any week, whenever, I just wanted to meet with them. I didn't get a response for another two weeks when finally she asked me again if I wanted to meet. I said I will see you at 10AM tomorrow with John.
We were most concerned that this might be a trap. Believe it or not, I have before gone in to meet with State officials only to find State Police awaiting me when I arrived. I wanted to be sure that would not happen, not because I had anything to fear, but because bad things happen to good people in jail all the time and John had a kid waiting for him at home. I asked her to assure us that there would be no retributions if we came in. She didn't answer, but we didn't have many options did we? We met her on June 7.
John met me in front of the Hartford office. He was irritated enough to wear a Long Shore Sailing School Tee Shirt to the meeting because he felt that if he could explain to Sue that he visited Long Shore once, and loaded on their desk the equivalent of a years worth of money at CCB for just one day Long Shore. He felt she would have to understand that this is for those among us who can't afford to own boats, pay big fees to use the water and otherwise never get a chance to go boating- this should be the mission of the DEEP, shouldn't they agree? They did.
We waited for 45 mins to begin the meeting but were informed that the enforcement officer for the case was delayed picking on some other hapless waterfront owner and could not join us. Instead, we met with the Director Brian Thompson and Sue Jacobson herself. We started by explaining why we needed the boat house and what it would do for us. We also explained that our mission was to provide low income families with access to Long Island Sound through boating and that we had no place on shore to store our equipment. We explained that we had no idea why they were picking on us and that we had registered the vessel and the USCG gave us the green light. Sue nodded knowingly and said, "OH That's right, the Coast Guard says its OK." Brian listened intently for the hour we were speaking, John made his points. I made mine. A book of Connecticut statutes set nicely next to Brian's hand, dog eared and tabbed with post it notes, but he never opened it while we were there.
After a long pause he started, "While your cause is noble and we agree with your mission, we're in a tough spot here. Bridgeport wants you out of there and they are pursuing this complaint. We don't have a lot of flexibility."
I, ever the retortist, responded in my best legalese, that maybe there was a mechanism in the law where we could be allowed to finish the boat house and take it out of State by Labor Day. He said that that might work, but that then the DEEP would look like they were kicking CCB out of Bridgeport. I didn't say it out loud, but I thought to myself, "You are Duhh?" Sue chimed in that Bridgeport would never go for it. I asked that maybe since they were the highest power in the land that they might act as a go between between us and Bridgeport to see if they could sell Bridgeport on this idea. She agreed and Brian wanted to us to know that we would be legally bound to leave Connecticut if we agreed. I think they called it something like an Order of Compliance. We agreed.
And then we waited. July came and went. August marched in and started marching out. Before we reached Labor Day I wanted to let them know that we were waiting for the orders to start work. We arranged to consult with a lawyer before we did anything though, because when you poke a tiger it always best to carry a big stick. I wrote the letter but didn't mail it because we didn't have the funding to ramp up construction and I needed to find a job to pay for it before I agreed to do it. The lawyer suggested we go ahead and send the letter and see what they said. If they come back at us in an aggressive manner, he said he would help us out. Then a week later he sent us a $400 bill for the consultation and we realized he wouldn't be helping us either.
Then I went back to painting. Broke and home in foreclosure, I had to make some money to eat. John found me a gig painting and while the pay wasn't great, it helped me put on a couple of pounds. I also thought about joining the Navy. At 37, I was a bit old, but the Navy now takes geezers like me in OCS. I was fully prepared to leave the State, have John cut down the boat house and slowly back away from CCB and that's when the email came.
Bill Coleman announced that the City planned to seize our boat house and docks and boats and moorings and ramp and take it all to some place where we had to pay for the removal. The DEEP hadn't answered us in months, and we had no idea what was coming next, but that email wasn't on the radar. We had two weeks to do something or every dime I have invested in CCB over the years, all the efforts we have made to open the waters and the thousands of kids we hoped would one day sail from Bridgeport harbor would all be lost. We needed the courts.
And so that is what has happened to date. Obviously I am putting this in a book and whatever happens when it's done, I will make sure it is written for the ages to see. The raw deal CCB is getting cannot be forgiven and those who have taken part in it's undoing will answer for what they have done. If not in court then at the polls. If not in the polls then in the legislature. And if not in the legislature then by their creator when they leave this planet and have to atone for their sins. I believe justice is like a glacier. It may take a generation to get there, but make no mistake, it's moving just the same. The only problem is today I am worried about global warming so who knows what will happen tomorrow- that's probably why I went into sailing rather than the church. Wish me luck.
I was asked by a local Bridgeport resident to explain how we got to this state of affairs at CCB with the City. Bridgeport would have you believe as one Bridgeport official puts it that this is a "another well orchestrated tantrum of 'whoa is me'".
Ok maybe we are doing a bit of "woe is me". Considering we paid $35,000 to build a facility and were ordered, complete with veiled threats of violence, to move our boats out of the THEIR harbor, before we ever completed the facility or been allowed to put one season of operation in, I think we are entitled.
But it didn't start with the order in March to remove our boats from the moorings. It didn't start with the DEEP Notice of Violation about our boat house. It started well before that when things went south in Seaside Park and they have only gotten worse from there.
I met Bill Coleman on a tour of Bridgeport Harbor aboard the Harbor Masters boat back in late 2010. I explained to him then that we had been forced to shut down due to a massive increase in park fees and a complete breakdown of dealings with the Charlie Carrol. Mr. Carrol didn't like me, it was clear, but the $130 per season parking fee every out of town student and member was being asked to pay was the last straw at Seaside Park. At the end of 2010, I called it quits there in the hopes that I could get our ship back on course to open Bridgeport Harbor, which was my original idea when starting CCB.
We began dealings with Bill Coleman almost immediately to obtain permission to move to downtown Bridgeport for the 2011 summer season. We did clean ups, sent letters, fundraised and fully prepared to try and open the Bridgeport Boat Basin in 2011. We waited in January, February, March, April, May and June to get the ok to start work, but when July rolled around, it really was too late to do anything. Then Irene slammed into the North East, the Halloween Blizzard crippled the Northern part of CT and before you knew it, Christmas, New Years and 2012 was here- another wasted year trying to make this happen. But I have been working since 2006 to try and make Bridgeport a better place to live, what is one more year- right?
At the start of 2012, CCB was still trying to recover from a fundraiser failure at Black Rock Yacht Club, where some good meaning people racked up a giant drink bill and left CCB to cover it after they failed to raise the funds they assured us they would raise. That debacle left us with a load of debt, still no revenue and a Board who had decided that now the hard work was over, they would let me go as the Executive Director because of my sunshiny personality and do things themselves, namely have drinking parties aboard our fleet with the closed sign on the front gate. We had a big shake up in early 2012 on the CCB Board and when the smoke cleared, we had a half dozen board members all set and prepared to move CCB out of Bridgeport.
My critical mistake was convincing my board to make one last go at the Bridgeport Boat Basin and I overruled their decision and started the process again to get the Mayor's office to initiate an agreement to use Bridgeport Harbor.
In January 2012, I started the calls again. Sometime around then I got a call from Pete Holecz, Harbor Commission chair. Pete has always been a fair guy in my estimation and if you need to know the inside scoop on Bridgeport politics, he is the guy to talk to. Pete called me at 730 in the morning, as he often did, to tell me I had to shut my mouth when it comes to bad mouthing Bridgeport. Taken aback that he was in on the whisper campaign of "Chris German is a hot headed loud mouth who hates Bridgeport", I asked Pete if he could give me an example of one way I have ever bad mouthed the City I love so dearly. He could not, but warned me if I didn't shut up, things would not go my way.
Im still not sure what I said that got under the skin of so many in Bridgeport. I know I wrote a facebook post about the Connecticut Post article that stated raw sewage was dumped into Black Rock harbor 40 times in 2009 that ruffled a few feathers. I also know I have no friend in Charlie Carrol, and quite frankly he's the guy to know if you want to do anything in Bridgport, so I am guessing that's where it all came from. But it gelled for me when I saw Judge Carmen Lopez's Op Ed in the paper on May 29, of this year that I felt vindicated. Almost a Birthday Present for me!
In it she explains that "When legitimate concerns and complaints are raised, the entrenched political and economic powers in our city are quick to demonize opponents. The machinery to produce a whisper campaign of deceit, innuendos and half-truths is immediately put into action."
When I read that piece I said with my hot head and my loud mouth, "BRILLIANT". That is exactly what is going on here and someone had the guts to say it. It helps that she is a judge and kind of protected from the mess downtown, but all the same she said it- That was awesome.
So back to early 2012. After three months of back and forth, more than a few tense moments with Bill Coleman, we somehow had a summit of sorts. Me, Bill Coleman, Bill Finch, Adam Wood and Charlie Carroll all sat down in City Hall Annex to see if there was a way to make me happy. I started by explaining the parking issue at Seaside and Charlie said, "Well why didn't you tell me, you can come in the park free of charge?" I don't think he understood that it is isn't about me, the public was being price gouged to use the waters of Long island Sound and that was wrong. In either case, I thanked him and we moved on to the real point of the meeting- how to open Bridgeport Harbor.
The Mayor got real serious with me and looked me strait in the eye. He said, "Chris, people don't like you. They think you say bad things about the City and I am inclined to agree. I had to pull in all kinds of favors to get you your agreement. But I need you to promise me, you will shut up. I need you to be part of the team, I need you to keep the higher ups in this City happy. Cause if you don't, we'll get you." I was a little scared I have to admit, but I sheepishly agreed and we were off.
On March 26, 2013, I got a very one sided lease agreement from the City to sign that said we could access the water for the purpose of building a community boating program. Every lawyer I have talked to about this says I was a fool for signing it, but what no one seems to realize, this is not about me, it is about the public, its about the kids, its about others- so if it hurts me a little and there is nothing in it for me, so be it, it does what it needs to do, open Bridgeport Harbor for all.
And that April we began work. I bought a 17' Wellcraft from Hitchcock Marine in Stratford. I needed it because I had to drive down to Darien to get the docks that would become the base of the Bridgeport Boat Basin. If you missed the 18-hour adventure on Facebook, there are lots of photos, but invariably, that long at sea with only a bird to talk to killed a few brain cells in me. I did have one visitor that day. Tha harbor master drove a half an hour down to Norwalk to say hello to me. When I asked him to grab a line and give me a hand towing it back to Bridgeport he said no and drove away. Ten hours later I pulled in Black Rock Harbor. I had no place to store the docks, no place to park the boat or any other shore support- the City wouldn't let me use the abandoned properties off Direktor or Pequonnock, but by hook or by crook, I got the docks, and things started to happen. By Labor Day it was done for the most part.
Around that time Bass Pro announced they were thinking about coming to Bridgeport and I was chatting about that with my friends in Stratford who used to own that site until the City took it 30 years ago. They said they were invited to the event the Mayor was holding to announce the site. I told them that was great, we'd love a new neighbor in Bridgeport Harbor. He said, "Chris, your not going to be there" I said, "What do you mean?" He said that he was well sourced in the City and that he had heard a plot was afoot to seize our facility from CCB once we were done so that they could use it for themselves. That point was born out in a later conversation John had with Bill Colemen where he said, "We're not sure what we'll do with your stuff, probably open up transient moorings there when your gone". The short of it, the day I signed that access agreement was the day the City stared planning on ways to take it over.
When I heard that I knew I needed to go big or go home. Just because your paranoid, doesn't mean your wrong. I told this to the board and we all decided that we needed a way to move in a hurry because when the order came, there would be no "you have six months to leave", it would be, "get out in two weeks or were taking it all". Guess what happened last week?
Chapter 9
This is when we came up with the idea for the floating boat house. As long as we were stuck to shore, we couldn't avoid the eventual take over. Our storage container at Seaside, our fleet on the hard in the Landfill, all of that was at risk. And when theives broke in and stole $150,000 of tools, gear and materials from us, we realized, floating was probably the best answer of all. That idea got even more support in Hurricane Sandy.
When the storm was predicted to make landfall in the NYC area, I knew we had some vulnerabilities. Our docks, our vessels, our ramp all were vulnerable to wind and seas. Our only hope was that the Boat Basin was protected enough to withstand such a blow. However, with 30 feet of water to anchor through in the Boat Basin, storm surge could make things a bit dicey. We moved Jumbo up river to the old dolphins off the Sliver by the River. We moored all vessels with double bridals, stripped sails and pumped everything dry. We filled the rainbows with water and sunk them at the dock. The added weight of the water would give our dock more inertia and the vessels would not be bashed against the rails submerged. It had to work.
We took up position in the Holiday Inn that Friday night and awaited the winds.
Around 10 PM Friday, the winds had picked up. The tide was high and splashing over the planks at the Ferry terminal. The fleet was riding nicely and docks were holding fast. We would be ok if this was as bad as it would get. By Saturday morning the wind had freshened to a steady 35 and the tide was going up again. Unfortunately, the projected winds from the Southeast were not materializing, but instead they blew a steady northeast and our boats were pointing the wrong way. One by one as the tide grew higher the moorings failed. Boats drifted and all seemed to be going wrong.
We went out there at 3PM, lashed the fleet as a giant pile and hoped for the best. We continued to check on it every hour after that, but by 6PM the winds were topping out at 50 and the tide had not fallen. We couldn't see Jumbo, but knew she had tug boat lines attached to dolphins that were designed to hold a Staten Island Ferry. She'd be ok. But the rest of the fleet was in peril. After the boats drifted, the storm surge was our next worry. The ramp was not designed to go above 10 feet and we had no idea what the mooring lines would do when the docks lifted that high. And then the lights went out.
We tried to go out again at 7PM but parts of the roof were blowing down the street at 60 miles an hour. Giant sheets of metal flew through the air like paper, but if met by the human body would slice like a Ginsu knife through a tomato. We walked out the front door of the hotel, and wandered a few feet down the block, but water was clearly rising over the street and the winds were rattling the electric lines above the train station. Giant blue arcs filled the air and in the distance the skyline glowed over Stratford where we were sure a fire was raging. It was not fit for man nor beast outside and it's never worth dying for a boat. We settled in with the rest of the patrons of the hotel huddled around a single surge protector with cell phones.
By 11PM the winds had abated. We went out to Water Street and saw a news crew from Canada standing by our dock. We went to the reporter to chat, but were quickly distracted by the river surging under the train tracks. Eight feet of water poured over the rails of the pier and all lights were out. The doors at the train station were locked and we could not get in to get high enough to review the fleet and docks. What was happening? How did we do? Realizing nothing would be known until the tide dropped and the sun came up the next morning, we went to bed for a few hours.
I woke at 6AM and went down to the docks, the tide was retreating and our fleet was still piled up around the moorings. I rushed down to see the docks and ramp and it was clear that water had covered them. 1000 pounds of sticks, grass and trash were piled on our ramp and docks, but the rainbows had done their job. It was all still there. Everything floated up with the tide, the moorings lost contact with the ground, but it all settled back down when the tide went out.
Jumbo didn't even have grass on her decks. She rode out the storm like a champ and their wasn't even a chaffe mark on her gunnels. The old adage, "The Tree that Bends Doesn't Break" The things we did to work with the storm worked beautifully, the things we did to fight the storm failed miserably. Lesson learned, float don't fight. A floating boat house was the way to go.
And so in November we started building.
Chapter 10
When designing a floating boat house, we had a bunch of things to consider. What could we do with it? How would we move it? Where would we source the materials? The one question we didn't consider was who would permit it. Sue Jacobson of the DEEP told us a long while back that such a project would never be permitted in the State and that if we tried to appeal her decision, we would never get a permit issued to us in this State ever again. So when I heard that, I knew what every plan I suggested to the board would have to be one that could circumvent the obstacles and supersede the State regulation of our waterways. Who would give us the green light to move forward? Certainly not the DEEP, but how about any other regulatory officials? Believe it or not if you get into trouble on Long Island Sound, the DEEP is the last to show up. The first will be the US Coast Guard. They also regulate all commercial traffic, maintain navigational aids and issue permits to build vessels in Connecticut and in the United States. And if you have to piss someone off, I always recommend avoiding the ones with guns.
As it is always better to beg forgiveness than ask permission, we began building to see how our State and City regulators would react. At first, I got a nasty email from Pete Holecz asking me what the hell I thought I was doing. That Boat House wasn't on the permit for the DEEP, where did I get the permission to do so. I explained we were building a boat and required no State or local permits. Radio silence took over for a while and I hoped that would be it.
We put up the first floor classroom walls and quickly moved onto the shop bay. The overheads for the office could be a standard eight feet, but the bay overheads would have to allow us to hoist a boat. Our idea was this shop could be used to build boats as our small boat fleet was stolen and the Pequonnock river was perfect for row boats. If we built our fleet this time rather than buy it, we would save a ton of money, could build anything we desired into the vessels and could involve the community in building our fleet. All we needed was the facility to start.
John got involved in the design and several of our volunteers were concerned about how we would anchor the superstructure to the dock. You can't fasten to concrete. Instead one of our volunteers came up with the idea to use industrial 3/4 inch J-bolts and lash the structure to the deck. We had to rent a hammer drill to create the anchor points and the big worry was as we lowered the walls down onto the bolts, someone had to hold the j-bolt with their hand- I saw finger juice squirting out of the seems in the deck. We sunk 18 of these bolts without so much as blister. But when I was being a stupid masculine ass showing another female how to toenail a corner, I smashed my finger and lost the nail. I hate being a guy sometimes.
The first floor framing completed shortly before Christmas- the snow was about to fly and I hoped we could at least get some shelter for the winter. We sail all year round at CCB and a spot to warm up would be nice. We got word that a blizzard would be coming shortly after the new year and without the funds to put all the plywood up, I had to go back to fundraising. That was when the political storm kicked up.
In February, I received a letter from the Harbor Master stating that I was (personally) to remove all of MY vessels from the moorings in Bridgeport Harbor. First off, I have been boating in Bridgeport since I was a kid and I have never heard of them enforcing the rule that boats had to be removed in winter. I wonder what whalers did in 1870 when they came to Bridgeport? Does the Port Jeff Ferry have to close up shop in winter? No that's how they make a living. This is how I make a living- what's the difference? Besides that, It was the last week in February and the new season started March 1. What was the point? But most importantly, THE BOATS WEREN'T MINE.
Although I feed myself with CCB, I no more own CCB than I own City hall. I am the executive director and while I have a greater voice than most in the board room, the boats are community property and open to all to use. I tried to explain that concept to the Harbor Master, but Tony Palumbo never quite got it. Instead, he ran around taking pictures of me, the fleet and the facilities to use against me and discredit me in the next Harbor Commission meeting. Knowing I would receive no welcome at any more Harbor Commission Meetings in January and after receiving several threats of violence and injury at the hands of some of the drug addicts I kicked out of CCB, I had informed the Board that I would no longer represent CCB in Bridgeport and that a replacement representative must be found. John Madden stepped up- He's a good man.
John told me about the photos and told me that the harbor master stated when he presented them to him that he had had no idea John would be coming to the meeting and that it was never intended to be seen by him, rather it was designed as The Harbor Master put it, "To Get Chris German." I thought that statement pretty much summed up my point.
And so John began working with the City to become compliant with their complaints. He moved the boats to the only place we could find, our dock. He cleaned up the landfill and removed all the items that were still somewhat serviceable despite three years of theft, vandalism and neglect. (Bridgeport refused to lock the gates at the Landfill for more than two years resulting in the majority of the thefts. Their thought: If we cant get them to quit, maybe the wildlife will). He also started regularly attending Harbor Commission meetings so that John could keep the Harbor Commission apprised of our progress. John reported to the Harbor Commission in May that all items were clean and that we had complied. Jeff Burr, a consistently condescending and particularly contrary member of the Commission, attacked John complaining about the "Mess we left in Bridgeport" The Harbor Master to his credit rebuffed Mr. Burr saying that CCB had done a masterful job in complying and that Mr. Burr's complaints were unfounded.
John walked away from that meeting with the full understanding that there would be no way we could comply with the City as they were not to be satisfied with anything other than the full removal of me from the planet.
We began our efforts to find ways to raise the money to remove our facility and get out of Bridgeport knowing that as long as this administration pursued us, we would have no success in Bridgeport. And so we tried to go to Groton. We asked the Mayor of Groton if we could move there. She agreed enthusiastically at first, but when I referred her to speak to Bill Coleman (who I thought at that time was fair, even if he wasn't a friend) she mysteriously did a 180 and stopped returning calls. We then decided to try and build a school ship for our State, thinking that if we cant have a floating classroom, at least we can educate kids on the waves. I met with Sen Andy Maynard, State Senate Minority leader, about a State loan/grant package to fund the purchase of the "Mystic". On Sunday morning we met aboard the "Mystic" in Mystic with a couple of local volunteers from Mystic. Sen Maynard almost burst a seam when he heard our plan and said he would be calling me the next day to arrange to have me make a presentation to the State Senate. Mysteriously once again, after he made a few calls to his colleagues the line went dead.
Chapter 11
Every attempt we made to find a new Harbor in Connecticut started strong, but died a quiet death. That was when we decided that in order to save our investment, maybe it was best to go to another State. After all Manhattan Sailing Club has a floating boat house and MIT has a floating boat house. But New York City and Boston both have one thing going for them that Bridgeport doesn't, they are not in Connecticut.
So on a cloudy spring morning in late May, John and his son and I, hopped in the car and headed to Brooklyn. Rumors abounded on the web that a crazy beatnik had built a floating home in the Gowanus Canal. Naked ladies were rumored to sun bath in full view of the Long Island Expressway and late night parties complete with bongos and hashish were rumored to fill the night air. I had also seen some house boats the week before when we were delivering a 35' motor yacht from NJ to CT. NYC is not my cup of tea, but if they give us safe harbor away from the attacks of the DEEP and Bridgeport so be it. We set out to find the hidden underworld of water-born beatniks in the East River.
We found where they were. By accident, we swung down an empty, scary side street that we knew by satellite adjoined the Gowanus Canal, but otherwise had no obvious connection to the sea. Strange that despite being an Island, so much of NYC is so removed from the water? But sure enough, in the heart of the hood, at the end of what looks like the Gambino dumping ground, on a poisoned, forgotten superfund site in the middle of Brooklyn, we found ...the Gowanus Canal Canoe Club.
There we met a lovely young lady who offered us a paddle and a chance to explore the storied Gowanus Canal. She said that in it's former years the site was a real pit, but in recent years the water quality has improved and that they are working to make it better. By allowing folks to explore the waters of the Gowanus by Canoe, they are creating new stakeholders to help motivate tax payers to fix this small but intensely abused piece of the world. She said that every once in a while now you could see a fish swimming and that it hadn't caught on fire for years. We declined the offer not because the water was dirty, but we were in street clothes on a mission.
We asked her if she knew about the House Boat people and she said she knew them well. Apparently this young man was well liked, although not the most reliable. Only the Lord truly knew where he was now. The last she had heard, the guy was with some of the others living in Queens after Sandy had torn up the docks there. They got free docking cause the federal funding was taking forever and the owner couldn't afford to fix to reopen.
It was a lead we thought, thanked her profusely for the info, accepted a stack of informational place mats that gave visitors a walking tour of Gowanus superfund sites, and made our way for Flushing Meadows where I knew I had seen house boats before.
We drove past the US Tennis Center, the World Fair sites, we saw the damage left over from Sandy and visited some post apocalyptic parking lots that abutted the water. No where could we find the boat people in Queens. But we did kill our suspension system and get a better understanding of why Queens is not the place to live.
That was when we called Chris, the Guy with the Chickens in Bridgeport. He hangs out down there all the time and knows all the people who walk to their own tune. Chris said he thought he had heard of a yard in the Bronx that allowed boaters to live aboard and house boats to park. The difference between a house boat and boat house is simple- one you live in, one you work in. But for this purpose, we didn't think it mattered.
Hopping on the Cross Bronx, driving past the Home of the Evil Empire, we noodled our way to a yard on the upper reaches of the East River. It was better than Queens, but still not the place I wanted to call home. But if we had to go there, we had to go and life has a funny way of getting acceptable with enough time, so maybe that would happen here.
We GPS'd the East River and began following every nook and every cranny up towards Connecticut. We stopped in Walmart Parking lots, we hung our heads over over passes craning our necks to look up and down the channel to see if we could see anything that looked right. And then there it was, out of no where, we saw the first. It had geraniums in the windows and a garden hose neatly coiled next to a lawn chair. The paint was fresh and if you didn't know it was floating, you would think you were in Fairfield. Looking further down, a row of various shaped house boats, all equally well maintained, lined the canal. But this was all hidden from view behind a chain link fence and a four lane boulevard lined with car stereo installation shops.
A guy about my age was doing work on a sail boat parked next to the floating home. I called to him, but whether it was the din of traffic or the ears of a New Yorker, he could not hear me. Just then an older guy with a chow locker the size of a small VW poked his head out of the house boat. I called, "Hello Sir" He looked up with a scowl. I said, " How do I get in touch with someone here about parking my boat house?" He snarled back, "Read the freakin' sign". I said, "What sign?" "The one on the fucking wall". I said thank you and waved politely.
The sign was tucked between a spanish speaking law firm and bail bonds office. It said "XYZ Marina" Im not going to tell you where this is because apparently New York although much more decent about regulation, doesn't like the fact that these people live on their boats. I don't want to call them out here despite Joey Bag-Of_Donuts' pleasant demeanor. What I will tell you though is as we looked inside the yard, a faded white van was parked with a flat tire. On its side advertised for a security company and you'll never guess where it was from: Bridgeport. Irony.
We drove home not defeated, but a bit discouraged, what we were looking for was not another fight, just a place to finish building our boat house to put to sea. While with enough graft and persistent enough effort, we could likely get a spot in the Bronx to park, the cost, time and smell were not worth the effort. Lets see what the DEEP says, we pondered, but its an option.
Chapter 12
When I returned home I sent an email to Sue Jacobson asking her for a chance to sit in mediation to see if we could devise a plan to let us finish the boat house and then we were sure we could find an organization in NYC or Boston who would want it. After all, it would be self contained, fully off grid, completely registered and legal by USCG standards. We even had plans to install a tidal electric generator between the pontoons that would be the first of of its kind after our engineering friends at University of Bridgeport designed it. That was a hell of lot better than the beatniks who dumped their sewage over board and built their's from rail road yard scraps. We just needed the summer to finish and could be out of the State, quietly, by Labor Day.
Sue responded with an email saying incredulously that she had been trying to reach us for weeks! She said that yes mediation could work and asked me to suggest a few dates. As I have been living and breathing this thing for the last 7 years, did a date really matter? I explained to her that I would come any time, any day, any week, whenever, I just wanted to meet with them. I didn't get a response for another two weeks when finally she asked me again if I wanted to meet. I said I will see you at 10AM tomorrow with John.
We were most concerned that this might be a trap. Believe it or not, I have before gone in to meet with State officials only to find State Police awaiting me when I arrived. I wanted to be sure that would not happen, not because I had anything to fear, but because bad things happen to good people in jail all the time and John had a kid waiting for him at home. I asked her to assure us that there would be no retributions if we came in. She didn't answer, but we didn't have many options did we? We met her on June 7.
John met me in front of the Hartford office. He was irritated enough to wear a Long Shore Sailing School Tee Shirt to the meeting because he felt that if he could explain to Sue that he visited Long Shore once, and loaded on their desk the equivalent of a years worth of money at CCB for just one day Long Shore. He felt she would have to understand that this is for those among us who can't afford to own boats, pay big fees to use the water and otherwise never get a chance to go boating- this should be the mission of the DEEP, shouldn't they agree? They did.
We waited for 45 mins to begin the meeting but were informed that the enforcement officer for the case was delayed picking on some other hapless waterfront owner and could not join us. Instead, we met with the Director Brian Thompson and Sue Jacobson herself. We started by explaining why we needed the boat house and what it would do for us. We also explained that our mission was to provide low income families with access to Long Island Sound through boating and that we had no place on shore to store our equipment. We explained that we had no idea why they were picking on us and that we had registered the vessel and the USCG gave us the green light. Sue nodded knowingly and said, "OH That's right, the Coast Guard says its OK." Brian listened intently for the hour we were speaking, John made his points. I made mine. A book of Connecticut statutes set nicely next to Brian's hand, dog eared and tabbed with post it notes, but he never opened it while we were there.
After a long pause he started, "While your cause is noble and we agree with your mission, we're in a tough spot here. Bridgeport wants you out of there and they are pursuing this complaint. We don't have a lot of flexibility."
I, ever the retortist, responded in my best legalese, that maybe there was a mechanism in the law where we could be allowed to finish the boat house and take it out of State by Labor Day. He said that that might work, but that then the DEEP would look like they were kicking CCB out of Bridgeport. I didn't say it out loud, but I thought to myself, "You are Duhh?" Sue chimed in that Bridgeport would never go for it. I asked that maybe since they were the highest power in the land that they might act as a go between between us and Bridgeport to see if they could sell Bridgeport on this idea. She agreed and Brian wanted to us to know that we would be legally bound to leave Connecticut if we agreed. I think they called it something like an Order of Compliance. We agreed.
And then we waited. July came and went. August marched in and started marching out. Before we reached Labor Day I wanted to let them know that we were waiting for the orders to start work. We arranged to consult with a lawyer before we did anything though, because when you poke a tiger it always best to carry a big stick. I wrote the letter but didn't mail it because we didn't have the funding to ramp up construction and I needed to find a job to pay for it before I agreed to do it. The lawyer suggested we go ahead and send the letter and see what they said. If they come back at us in an aggressive manner, he said he would help us out. Then a week later he sent us a $400 bill for the consultation and we realized he wouldn't be helping us either.
Then I went back to painting. Broke and home in foreclosure, I had to make some money to eat. John found me a gig painting and while the pay wasn't great, it helped me put on a couple of pounds. I also thought about joining the Navy. At 37, I was a bit old, but the Navy now takes geezers like me in OCS. I was fully prepared to leave the State, have John cut down the boat house and slowly back away from CCB and that's when the email came.
Bill Coleman announced that the City planned to seize our boat house and docks and boats and moorings and ramp and take it all to some place where we had to pay for the removal. The DEEP hadn't answered us in months, and we had no idea what was coming next, but that email wasn't on the radar. We had two weeks to do something or every dime I have invested in CCB over the years, all the efforts we have made to open the waters and the thousands of kids we hoped would one day sail from Bridgeport harbor would all be lost. We needed the courts.
And so that is what has happened to date. Obviously I am putting this in a book and whatever happens when it's done, I will make sure it is written for the ages to see. The raw deal CCB is getting cannot be forgiven and those who have taken part in it's undoing will answer for what they have done. If not in court then at the polls. If not in the polls then in the legislature. And if not in the legislature then by their creator when they leave this planet and have to atone for their sins. I believe justice is like a glacier. It may take a generation to get there, but make no mistake, it's moving just the same. The only problem is today I am worried about global warming so who knows what will happen tomorrow- that's probably why I went into sailing rather than the church. Wish me luck.
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