Planning to use the Jamestown Newport Ferry this season. Why a dispute may ruin that idea.

JAMESTOWN — A dispute between the town of Jamestown and Conanicut Marine Services, Inc. could result in the Jamestown Newport Ferry discontinuing service for the foreseeable future.

The town claims CMS has taken over a public portion of the marina at East Ferry Wharf with its operations, preventing public access to the space. Meanwhile, CMS contends it is allowed to operate ferry boats there as a result of the money it paid to help install the dock and the multi-year lease agreement the company has held with the town for decades.

“The Town’s (sic) maintains that it owns and controls the use of the public touch and go space at East Ferry and remains committed to protecting public access to Town owned facilities and the waterfront,” Town Council president Nancy Beye wrote in the town’s statement about the situation.

The company has since put out a petition to “Save the Jamestown Newport Ferry,” which has garnered over 1,500 signatures in four days.

“The Jamestown Town Council should do everything it can to keep the Jamestown Newport Ferry service in place for Jamestown residents and the general public,” the petition reads.

At the center of the discussion lies ownership of a concrete dock

The specific dock in dispute is a concrete float, the “inner touch-and-go dock,” at the town-owned marina in East Ferry Wharf. CMS helped construct the concrete float in 2019 to improve ADA accessibility for the Jamestown Newport Ferry and other vessels that use the public marina as a part of a public-private partnership with the town. CMS funded the project alongside a federal grant administered through the Rhode Island Department of Transportation, which CMS claims was granted exclusive to the company.

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Essentially, the town claims ownership and control over use of the concrete float, whereas CMS argues that, due to the way the project was funded and the lease agreement the town has with the company through its parent company, CMS should be allowed to use the dock for its ferry services.

In an interview with the Jamestown Press, Jamestown Chief of Police Ed Mello claimed that while CMS had been allowed to use the concrete float to accommodate handicapped passengers in the past, CMS used the float more frequently during the 2022 boating season after losing access to its private marina. CMS Owner Bill Munger had sold the marina operations-portion of his business, and the privately owned marina, to TPG Marinas in December 2021. The lease CMS holds with the town to use the marina was transferred over to TPG and TPG leases an area of the docking space under its jurisdiction to CMS for its ferries.

Mello also claimed CMS was illegally parking the Coastal Queen vessel on the southern side of the town-owned woodpile pier. In October 2022, the town sent a cease and desist to the company, telling CMS to halt its use of the East Ferry concrete float and remove all of the company’s signage from the area.

Negotiations have resulted in an impasse between Jamestown and CMS

In her statement, Beye claims CMS lost its interest in the marinas as a result of this sale, while CMS maintains in its own statement that, when this dispute began in summer 2022, the company was still a paying seasonal tenant of the dock space through its agreement with TPG.

Beye said the town “exerted tremendous effort,” to reach a use agreement with CMS that would protect public access while allowing the ferries to operate in December, however CMS rejected their proposal. In the timeline CMS provides, the company claims the agreement was a standalone one-year license agreement that allows the Jamestown Newport Ferry access to both the woodpile pier and concrete float, but maintains the town’s ownership of the dock and “no compensation for the funds CMS provided to build both items.” It also claims the town rejected a “commercially reasonable lease agreement,” wherein CMS “waives their ownership rights to the concrete float and ADA access gangway ramp,” in October, as well as a revised lease proposal for the south side of the woodpile pier currently under TPG’s jurisdiction in February 2023.

The town voted to end the discussion in February, which CMS claims means the Jamestown Newport Ferry can no longer provide services to and from Jamestown. In its timeline and statement, CMS asks the public to write to the town council to continue negotiations on the lease.

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“Our leaders have chosen to dispense with a ferry service that brings visitors from both sides of the bay to Jamestown’s shops and restaurants and that employs 60 people, 25 of which are Jamestown residents; along with numerous local vendors,” CMS’s statement reads. “This ferry service provides transportation for the public to connect from Jamestown to the various points on lower Narragansett Bay, which includes Rose Island, Newport’s Fort Adams, Perrotti Park and Ann Street Pier.”

This article originally appeared on Newport Daily News: Jamestown Newport Ferry service may be discontinued following dispute