# Is Homelessness Rendering Cruising Dead?



## Crewm8 (Feb 18, 2008)

My story is similar to many but I've noticed a trend over the last 10 years that I believe is now crippling, in many places, the very essence of this sport and industry. The pressure put on marinas from the recent increase in homelessness.

After spending time working on the boat, my wife and I moved aboard like many of us. Also like many, our dream of sailing entailed learning, in our case through the ASA, practicing with other sailors, spending years gaining knowledge about the myriad of boat systems, perfecting brightwork, etc. We enjoy the art and activity of sailing with all it entails, we're constantly learning and working on the boat to varying degrees. We take pride in our old boat and maintain it.

After a good bit of work getting there, I became a (semi, I'd like to think) competent skipper. I was thinking about it the other day and realized I have cruised my boat in and out of now 26 marinas along the central to sourthern pacific coast of California. For years, one of our brands of cruising has been hopping from marina to guest dock to marina as a guest, spending a few days anchored out, mooring, then switching to a month or two in a new marina, with any number of variations. We like the idea of being free to explore new places, meet new people and enjoy the cruising lifestyle. After a short while, after we've enjoyed a spot enough, we take off and cruise for a bit, picking a new marina to relax for a bit. It's fun and in my honest opinion, it's the true intention of a dock, to provide a means to enjoy boating to both local residents and travelers. There are many other ways to enjoy boating, but this is one I like.

Lately, however we've noticed a trend increasing drastically that started long before I was born, even. You'll find ample stories of people who have realized this "cruising" lifestyle costs significantly less than life on land. They find one of an increasing fleet of dilapitadted, neglected and old boats for a small fraction of their original value. This is so rampant throughout nearly every marina I have been in that it's cliche and goes without saying. I jokingly call many of them "****aboards" because...well... One after another they tell the same story that "it's cheaper than renting". Invariably "they" infiltrate marina after marina, filling liveaboard slips and their waitlists, anchorages and mooring for the opportunity to save money. Who can blame them and after all, it's better than living in a tent, right? Well...it's not boating.

I say "they" because, despite their desire to just live and let live, they all have a series of common traits that in my opinion do nothing short of ruin the very intention of marinas, the sport of sailing and the enjoyable lifestyle of cruising. "They" are categorically different from sailors and make it difficult, often impossible to enjoy a cruising lifestyle for one reason alone, they take up space that otherwise should go to an active vessel. "They" have no interest in boating or sailing, spend no time learning how, have zero intention of ever taking their boat out, simply using the boat as an apartment.

Unlike 10 or so years ago, every single marina is full of people treating boat as if they were apartments. Boat after boat, waiting to die, bearded from neglect, plants planted, piled with "stuff", unwilling or unable to move and bound till death by housing laws. Call any number of marinas looking for space, especially since covid and you'll hear "full", "X year waiting list". Every marina I go to now is jam packed and jaded.

I am lucky enough to have a good enough relationship with one harbormaster but they are not governed by the California Coastal Commission for liveaboard percentages. We were able to luckily grab a slip during my wife's pregnancy and childbirth. We're now at a point where we're considering our next move and frankly we're very concerned about leaving open-ended. We'd love to hit the channel islands for a while but after a couple months, sadly we'd run in to the same issue finding a place.

I have seen a number of harbormasters handle the situation well. They know the deal. They can distinguish cruisers and work to keep their docks free of "****aboards". Sadly they are few and far between and frankly because of the current climate, offer no grace or considerations usually until they see your boat is well maintained. If you are a harbormaster that does this, that distinguishes and scrutinizes your customers, thank you. You are saving this sport and industry. 

I'll end my rant but I'd be interested to hear what some of you think, if you've experienced the same thing and how your marina operates when it comes to this matter.


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## Don L (Aug 8, 2008)

On the US East Coast I haven't noticed much change the last 10 years. My first 5 years were in the NE and boats got hauled out in winter, so that really reduced liveaboards. Back then I kept my boat on a mooring and there were hardly any full timers on their boats. In fact few boats even had people come once a month.

The last 5 years full time cruising up/down the coast I haven't seen much change either., The biggest issue in Florida is the derelict anchored boats and the long term anchored trash boats that clog up all the space. The marina I currently am at doesn't allow "live aboards", which is OK as I am a "cruisier". But the harbormaster would look the other way if a boat is maintained and the people on it don't become a problem.

Now if you really want to see the issue you need to go someone with the fulltime anchor out homeless like in Boot Key/Marathon. Then you would understand the problem with boat scum better.

But away from towns etc. that collect homeless and low lifes you normally only cruisers on maintained boats.

Of course I bet there is a big difference between CA and the east Coast as to anchorages etc.


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## MikeOReilly (Apr 12, 2010)

It's not something I've experienced up where I've cruised, up here in the Canadian Great Lakes and more recently the St. Lawrence and Newfoundland. Winter haul out cuts down on any year-round liveaboards, and we just don't have the population density to generate many of these problems.

But since yours is a rant, I'll respond in kind . I'm sure the issues you cite are very real, but the way you phrase it feels very elitist. Who's to say your needs are greater than the people you call crapaboards? Sounds like on the scale of things, their needs are greater since everyone needs a home.

The issues you cite are far bigger than any one of us. It has to do with social equity and treating all people like people. Homelessness is a community problem that we can all help address, in one small part by electing the right kinds of politicians.

But I understand that these issues go far beyond the individual, and I don't like a crapped-up boat beside me any more than the next person.

As the adage goes, the only one you can really change is yourself. The wonder of cruising is that if you don't like the surrounds, you can move your home. So you probably need to point your bow elsewhere. North or south will take you to places less popular. I'm sure you can find the what you are looking for if you go far enough.


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## marcjsmith (Jan 26, 2021)

for a harbormaster to pose judgements and scrutiny, I think could be treading a very fine line. at what point does it become discriminatory?

Private dock, private rules. Kind of like and HOA I guess. But also comes down to $$$ if the person who owns the tramp steamer or the well kept yacht that never leaves dock, but both pay their bills on time and don't cause a problem. hard to pass up the $$$ 

I have a friend, who's a full time cruiser, never stays in one place more than a couple weeks, but came up to the Chesapeake for the summer to get out of hurricane season. He had a difficult time finding a slip that permits someone to be onboard full time. His vessel is smart, well taken care of, not an eyesore. Personally I would think having a few full time folks at the docks might help the habormaster. Call it an informal neighborhood watch. 

on my pier we have 5 sailboats and 8 power boats (marina has space for 75 boats (50% occupied right now). when I arrived in april, two sailboats where already there(haven't moved in a couple seasons based on growth and deflated fenders etc), two sailboats came in a couple weeks later (they haven't left the slip this year). Out of the power boats Ive seen evidence of 6 leaving the slip, I doubt two of them run. two of the sedans are "weekend condo's" four are fishing, the last two, floating dumpsters. I may not like looking at the boats that dont leave, but as long as they are paying rent then that means my rent won't go up..

I don't really think that homelessness has any effect on cruising, at least not in my part of the bay... I think that people who don' t use their boat and let it sit a slip rotting away by far would have more effect than the occasional livaboard. here are people who have a boat and the boat functions, but by not using it, migth as well just keep it on the hard and allow someone else to use the slip.


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## Sailormon6 (May 9, 2002)

There's nothing inherently illegal or improper about discrimination. When we get up in the morning and choose to wear a blue shirt rather than a white shirt, we're discriminating. Another word for it is "choice." Discrimination is only illegal when it's based on race, religion, etc.

Wanting to live in a safe, quiet, attractive, peaceful, low crime neighborhood with good schools is neither elitist nor an unlawful discrimination. That's the essence of the American Dream, but it's misleading to call it an American dream. Those aspirations are shared universally by people all over the planet. It's perfectly normal and acceptable for people to want to live in a place where it's a little more comfortable, quiet, safe, attractive, etc. That's why so many people want to emigrate to this country. They're looking for better living and working conditions for themselves and their families. It's puzzling when people vilify others for aspiring to a better life.


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## Attikos (May 26, 2018)

Marinas in my area are free to choose whether or not to accept liveaboards. Many don't due not only to the problems you cite but for the difficulty of turning a profit on them. Liveaboards consume more of everything, from utilities to space in the lounge. Mind if I ask why they're not doing likewise on the west coast? Oversupply of slips, or regulation discouraging it, or something?


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## Don L (Aug 8, 2008)

Attikos said:


> Liveaboards consume more of everything, from utilities to space in the lounge.


And frequency PAY an extra fee for it. Two summers ago I was paying a $300/mo liveaboard fee in a marina, which was 40% of my total monthly bill. This covered the extra 60 gal of water/week we used, plus the extra cost of the daily small bag of trash. There was no lounge, we didn't take up space in the parking lot, didn't use the showers as you would just get sweaty walking back.

Prior to that I stayed in a marina for a month and if I stayed a second month there was going to be an extra $150/mo for a liveaboard fee. I never figured out what my extra costs were going to be due to in month 2.

Lots of marinas that allow liveaboards charge extra.


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## s_ruffner (Aug 5, 2019)

I don't think this is terribly new. The first I remember hearing about it was back in the very early 90s around Dinner Key in Miami, but I'm sure I only became aware of it then because that's when I started hanging out near a marina in Miami (I read all the John D MacDonald Travis McGee books) . So, I don't really think it's "rising homelessness" - in fact, I'd suggest that most truly homeless people would struggle to get a boat cheaply and play a live aboard game for cheap housing. I do think there are plenty of people exploiting whatever they can to find cheap housing, because housing costs have risen much faster than wages. I also get the impression that a LOT of places are cracking down on live-aboards, at least officially, and then exercising judgement about selectively allowing folks who do maintain. I dunno, maybe this is a California thing? Here on the Chesapeake, I see plenty of places where owners do more or less live aboard (with annual slips), even where the official stated policy is no live-aboards. I also see lots of waiting lists, but that's more because marinas are vanishing, being replaced with Condos that include dockage. Sometimes the condo owners have no desire for a dock, and then lease their space to boaters.


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## emcentar (Apr 28, 2009)

At least in the Chesapeake, I find it is nice to have a few liveaboards around to keep an eye on things. Liveaboards here are a real mix economically: professionals with families living on catamarans, retired couples, a couple of single men I'd guess are recently divorced, which makes sense to me as I figure if my wife throws me out at least I have the boat, and won't have to live in a hotel  

I actually really appreciate how economically diverse many marinas in the Chesapeake are, a real mix of watermen, locals, and wealthy professionals. It's nice.


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## garymalmgren (Jan 26, 2021)

*One after another they tell the same story that "it's cheaper than renting".

Ahah. There you have hit upon the answer to your problem.
Let the market decide.
Run up the marina fees so that they are much more expensive than renting and you will get rid of "them".*


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## Sailormon6 (May 9, 2002)

This isn't a problem that's unique to marinas. Ask any landlord how they avoid renting to people who don't pay, make nuisances of themselves, damage property, and generally abuse their privileges as a tenant. They run a thorough background check and insist on references, or a marina can simply prohibit all liveaboards, The goal isn't to preclude poor people or people of a particular race or religion. That would be illegal. The goal is to preclude douchebags who don't know how to behave in a civilized manner.


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## joethecobbler (Apr 10, 2007)

I don't spend time worrying about how others choose to live.


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## Sal Paradise (Sep 14, 2012)

garymalmgren said:


> *One after another they tell the same story that "it's cheaper than renting".
> 
> Ahah. There you have hit upon the answer to your problem.
> Let the market decide.
> Run up the marina fees so that they are much more expensive than renting and you will get rid of "them".*


In the face of a historic housing crisis with commensurate price and rent increases? Good luck.


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## Sailormon6 (May 9, 2002)

joethecobbler said:


> I don't spend time worrying about how others choose to live.


If your life savings was wrapped up in your house, and circumstances made you desperate to sell your house, but the mess created by your neighbor next door made your property unmarketable by causing all your prospective buyers to look elsewhere, you'd understand why people don't want to live next to a cat lady with cat feces 3" thick throughout her house, with the associated smell, or a junk collector.

You can measure the dollars you'll lose of your life's savings by the severity of the nuisance created by your neighbor.


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## joethecobbler (Apr 10, 2007)

Sailormon6 said:


> If your life savings was wrapped up in your house, and circumstances made you desperate to sell your house, but the mess created by your neighbor next door made your property unmarketable by causing all your prospective buyers to look elsewhere, you'd understand why people don't want to live next to a cat lady with cat feces 3" thick throughout her house, with the associated smell, or a junk collector.
> 
> You can measure the dollars you'll lose of your life's savings by the severity of the nuisance created by your neighbor.


Yeah, well,
That's why I live on a boat, so I can easily relocate .
There's no better feeling than leaving a place where people cast despersions upon others.
Which, in my observations, is usually about everywhere .


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## marcjsmith (Jan 26, 2021)

Sailormon6 said:


> The goal is to preclude douchebags who don't know how to behave in a civilized manner.


the down side is that you can't really discern who's a douchebag or not based on what they, their boat or their life style looks like.

unfortunately the way civilization is going there seems to be more people who have forgotten how to be or were never taught how to be civilized, or they just don't give a F%^K. Unfortunately in many cases they get away with their behavior because many folks are just adverse to conflict. You just don't know how far someone who is acting like a douche will go.


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## s_ruffner (Aug 5, 2019)

marcjsmith said:


> the down side is that you can't really discern who's a douchebag or not based on what they, their boat or their life style looks like.


I mean: in the marina we're in, the biggest douchebags are on a big flybridge powerboat and like to bounce everyone in the channel (no wake zone) with their wake. There's definitely a whiff of "oh no, the poors next door" in this thread. It may be a reflection of where we access the bay that there is very little demand for using a boat as housing, so my perceptions are biased, and I can imagine that it's different in major metropolitan areas. The problem around Dinner Key with derelict stuff was real, and it seems like it is a bit of an issue in Boot Key Harbor (housing is a massive problem in the keys - absolutely un-affordable for a variety of reasons, beginning with a lack of land, but prevailing wages for service workers is definitely an element).

From what I can tell, it appears that developers are the real threat to marinas and cruisers. CF the GA attempts at defining Anchorages.


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## JimsCAL (May 23, 2007)

I also haven't seen much of this issue here in the Northeast. Probably a combination of the cold winters and high cost of marina slips.


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## SV Siren (Mar 8, 2013)

We don't see so much of this in the Great Lakes region as boats get hauled at the end of the season. You do get a variety of conditions, from pristine to not so well kept though. Sadly, I have noticed the number of boats on the hard in the yard seem to have doubled in the last 10 years in many yards storage areas. The age of the boat may vary from a relatively new-ish 5 year old, boat to a majority of them being 30+ years old. The "No cash no splash" rule is strictly enforced around here. Liveaboards are rare, few places officially allow them for the season, but will turn a blind eye for those who aren't a problem.


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## capta (Jun 27, 2011)

This is probably one of the saddest posts I've seen in a long time.
I have no idea where you get your info, but I find it highly unlikely that a homeless person would have the where-with-all to even pay dock rent, let alone an insurance policy necessary to get into and remain in a marina.
However, it is quite possible some single men or women have figured out that living aboard is cheaper than the apartment they had until covid.
Most people keep paying slip fees on their slip while they are cruising. Most likely the marina will sub-let, or use it as a transient slip while you are gone. But, if you don't like your new neighbors when you live aboard you can easily move without packing even one box! You sound as if you are pretty well heeled, so it seems the solution to your problem is to buy your own slip and you can be pretty sure no young person or a homeless person can afford $40 to 60k on a slip near you.


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## Minnewaska (Feb 21, 2010)

As has been noted above, I think the concept of junked up boats, overwhelming marinas, is a regional thing. Doesn't happen here. Just a rare exception. 

Several year back, there was a small family, with a couple of young kids aboard a 20 something foot boat that was anchored in the Bay, attempting to live on it permanently. Social services intervened, because the boat did not have minimal sanitation, potable water stores or heat for the winter. I don't know the parent's story. You can assume they were mentally unstable thinking that would work. Or you can assume they were doing their best. Either way, it was unacceptable for the kids. I don't recall the specifics, but recall my reaction to the description of the squalor down below. There is no requirement to keep a show boat, but there is is also no need to be filthy, just because you're poor.


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## SanderO (Jul 12, 2007)

Living year round on a hook is not possible for multiple reasons in NE... the main one being weather. Down south it seems like it could be an inexpensive way to live. Apparently many try, Towns don't like it.

We need affordable housing and that "problem" would not exist.


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## Greenwave (Jan 12, 2020)

Sailormon6 said:


> There's nothing inherently illegal or improper about discrimination. When we get up in the morning and choose to wear a blue shirt rather than a white shirt, we're discriminating. Another word for it is "choice." Discrimination is only illegal when it's based on race, religion, etc.
> 
> Wanting to live in a safe, quiet, attractive, peaceful, low crime neighborhood with good schools is neither elitist nor an unlawful discrimination. That's the essence of the American Dream, but it's misleading to call it an American dream. Those aspirations are shared universally by people all over the planet. It's perfectly normal and acceptable for people to want to live in a place where it's a little more comfortable, quiet, safe, attractive, etc. That's why so many people want to emigrate to this country. They're looking for better living and working conditions for themselves and their families. It's puzzling when people vilify others for aspiring to a better life.


I'll gently clarify for you that "choice" as you call it is only illegal when a law is set that is against your choice. I agree with the rest of your post.


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## capta (Jun 27, 2011)

Greenwave said:


> I'll gently clarify for you that "choice" as you call it is only illegal when a law is set that is against your choice.


Right now especially, there are a whole lot of Americans without the "choices" you mention. Many people are just trying to get by any way they can. Just because *you* find their way of life bothersome and an eyesore, perhaps you should thank your lucky stars it isn't you or your family in that situation.


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## capta (Jun 27, 2011)

Minnewaska said:


> As has been noted above, I think the concept of junked up boats, overwhelming marinas, is a regional thing. Doesn't happen here. Just a rare exception.
> 
> Several year back, there was a small family, with a couple of young kids aboard a 20 something foot boat that was anchored in the Bay, attempting to live on it permanently. Social services intervened, because the boat did not have minimal sanitation, potable water stores or heat for the winter. I don't know the parent's story. You can assume they were mentally unstable thinking that would work. Or you can assume they were doing their best. Either way, it was unacceptable for the kids. I don't recall the specifics, but recall my reaction to the description of the squalor down below. There is no requirement to keep a show boat, but there is is also no need to be filthy, just because you're poor.


When we arrived back in the US (St.T.) we (my daughter and I) had about $20.00 in my pocket. When my wife left us in the Seychelles, for a life on land, she stripped the bank accounts. I went to social services and asked for help until I got a job, which only took a few days, but payday was weeks away. They gave me food stamps, but the kind woman there advised me that if I needed any further support from social services they would then officially become involved and the system frowned on a single male parent with a daughter, on a boat. Needless to say, we managed fine with the food stamps and stayed well clear of the social services system.
My daughter had been living on boats with me since one day after her birth and I wasn't about to let those bureaucrats get involved in our lives.


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## Don L (Aug 8, 2008)

well in my experience the "homeless" boaters are not interested in that


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## Minnewaska (Feb 21, 2010)

SanderO said:


> We need affordable housing and that "problem" would not exist.


I am personally involved with an organization that provides millions of dollars annually and explicitly for affordable housing. The issue is wildly complex and physically building the housing does not solve it. You can hand a brand new house or apartment to someone who never had one and it often gets ruined. Not out of malice, but because they never learned how to take care of one. Food insecurity, employment, mental health, they all intersect.

The common denominator is fear. If one is afraid of where you're going to live, how you're going to eat, feed your kids, deal with your health, the most typical reaction is to freeze and do nothing. There are some fighters, but most freeze and watch the situation get worse and worse and worse, before even those that would voluntarily help even know. Many have no guidance or experience in the most basic things. Intervention is far more than money. Huge issue. It can be extremely sad, but we keep putting one foot in front of the other.


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## SanderO (Jul 12, 2007)

For sure solutions to the problem of housing for all are complex and a multi pronged approach is in order. I think that many problems would go away of each person has a "future" to move toward without surmountable hurdles. These hurdles intersect and include but are not limited to... age, health, education, training/skills, financial resources/self sufficiency, opportunity, location/local economy and so forth


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## Sailormon6 (May 9, 2002)

It has been well-said that "*your personal liberty to swing your arm ends where my nose begin*s." Your right to own cats ends when they create an unhealthy environment for the neighborhood, and a stench that makes it difficult for my family to eat, sleep and generally enjoy living in our own home. You have a right to play music on your property, but if you pump up the volume, especially at night when folks need to relax and sleep, and you prevent me from the reasonable enjoyment my property, then I have a legal remedy. If my neighbor injures me or my property by the way he uses his property, I have a legal remedy. We have no right to create a public or private nuisance.

We have no right to a legal remedy merely because our neighbor's behavior is "bothersome," or because he doesn't put his lawn mower away promptly, or for any trivial reason, but my neighbor has no right to injure me or damage my property rights, or to unreasonably deprive me of my use and enjoyment of my property.

I doubt that social services was threatening to take custody of your daughter simply because you lived on a boat. If that was their intent, then they were misguided. Typically, they inspect the living conditions, and, if the conditions were safe, sanitary, healthy, had the necessary working utilities, your daughter had food, all the necessities and was being educated, they would see no reason to interfere. The social services lady was probably telling you that living on a boat would generally be a mark in the negative column, because social services likes to see stability in a child's life, and an easily movable residence doesn't suggest stability. But, if all else was good, it's hard to imagine that they would take custody merely because of the boat.

In my career, I sometimes advised similar social service agencies, and occasionally their "good intentions" had to be reined in, but usually their actions were justified.


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## Greenwave (Jan 12, 2020)

capta said:


> Right now especially, there are a whole lot of Americans without the "choices" you mention. Many people are just trying to get by any way they can. Just because *you* find their way of life bothersome and an eyesore, perhaps you should thank your lucky stars it isn't you or your family in that situation.


I think you and I are on the same side of this. What I was trying to state was that choice exists as a right unless it has been legislated away. However, it only exists for legal immigrants and citizens in the USA. Just getting your body across the border doesn't then give you the right to have choices.


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## joethecobbler (Apr 10, 2007)

capta said:


> When we arrived back in the US (St.T.) we (my daughter and I) had about $20.00 in my pocket. When my wife left us in the Seychelles, for a life on land, she stripped the bank accounts. I went to social services and asked for help until I got a job, which only took a few days, but payday was weeks away. They gave me food stamps, but the kind woman there advised me that if I needed any further support from social services they would then officially become involved and the system frowned on a single male parent with a daughter, on a boat. Needless to say, we managed fine with the food stamps and stayed well clear of the social services system.
> My daughter had been living on boats with me since one day after her birth and I wasn't about to let those bureaucrats get involved in our lives.


Wise choices.
It seems oonce SS becomes a decision making part of the crew, they are difficult to separate from.
I consider myself fortunate to have never been in a position to consider their " assistance"
Had I , I'd likely reached out to church run food banks, no strings, just help.
I also raised my daughter afloat since 3yr of age, and homeschooled.
A single dad afloat does sometimes create a curiosity for some.


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## Don L (Aug 8, 2008)

Just a note

"homeless boaters" aren't cruisers! The vast majority of them I would say aren't even boaters and are more like people living on a floating "something"


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## capta (Jun 27, 2011)

Sailormon6 said:


> I doubt that social services was threatening to take custody of your daughter simply because you lived on a boat. If that was their intent, then they were misguided. Typically, they inspect the living conditions, and, if the conditions were safe, sanitary, healthy, had the necessary working utilities, your daughter had food, all the necessities and was being educated, they would see no reason to interfere. The social services lady was probably telling you that living on a boat would generally be a mark in the negative column, because social services likes to see stability in a child's life, and an easily movable residence doesn't suggest stability. But, if all else was good, it's hard to imagine that they would take custody merely because of the boat.


In 1978 the system was quite a bit more Draconian, with much less parental recourse, than today. However, I believe it was more the single male parent thing rather than the boat as such.


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## danvon (Dec 10, 2012)

capta said:


> This is probably one of the saddest posts I've seen in a long time.
> I have no idea where you get your info, but I find it highly unlikely that a homeless person would have the where-with-all to even pay dock rent, let alone an insurance policy necessary to get into and remain in a marina.
> However, it is quite possible some single men or women have figured out that living aboard is cheaper than the apartment they had until covid.
> Most people keep paying slip fees on their slip while they are cruising. Most likely the marina will sub-let, or use it as a transient slip while you are gone. But, if you don't like your new neighbors when you live aboard you can easily move without packing even one box! You sound as if you are pretty well heeled, so it seems the solution to your problem is to buy your own slip and you can be pretty sure no young person or a homeless person can afford $40 to 60k on a slip near you.


I don't think there's any homeless people in the marinas here in Seattle (anecdotally, there was an increase in people wanting to liveaboard when rents really spiked but those were just people looking for something cheaper than an apartment) but we do see some derelict-looking boats anchored out. Looks like a tough way to live - no services, not a lot of sheltered anchorages. I think that they did clear a lot of them out of a couple of the harbors on the Sound some years ago.

And if I could buy a slip for $40-$60k, I'd do it in a heartbeat. More like $200k in the city. There's no way you can make that pencil out.


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## SV Moondog (Jul 20, 2021)

s_ruffner said:


> I don't think this is terribly new. The first I remember hearing about it was back in the very early 90s around Dinner Key in Miami, but I'm sure I only became aware of it then because that's when I started hanging out near a marina in Miami (I read all the John D MacDonald Travis McGee books) . So, I don't really think it's "rising homelessness" - in fact, I'd suggest that most truly homeless people would struggle to get a boat cheaply and play a live aboard game for cheap housing. I do think there are plenty of people exploiting whatever they can to find cheap housing, because housing costs have risen much faster than wages. I also get the impression that a LOT of places are cracking down on live-aboards, at least officially, and then exercising judgement about selectively allowing folks who do maintain. I dunno, maybe this is a California thing? Here on the Chesapeake, I see plenty of places where owners do more or less live aboard (with annual slips), even where the official stated policy is no live-aboards. I also see lots of waiting lists, but that's more because marinas are vanishing, being replaced with Condos that include dockage. Sometimes the condo owners have no desire for a dock, and then lease their space to boaters.


While I tend to agree with your point about truly homeless people being able to acquire a dilapidated boat ( there are some boats that are so bad that they're "free") a homeless person wouldn't have the resources to get the boat to the water even if it did float. As for dilapidated boats, who wants to park their nice boat next to something riddled with termites and leaking stray electrical current into the marina - thereby either quickly eating your zincs or causing untold osmosis issues in your hull? Here in California they address the issue by raising the slip fees so high that few even legitimate cruisers can afford them much less homeless people. You can't find much gorilla mooring here in Southern California with the exception of maybe the back bay at Wilmington. People looking for a reasonable live aboard slip will find themselves in Oxnard/Ventura which is a good drive from any jobs on So Cal and even those marinas want to see what your boat looks like before they'll rent you a slip. Living on a derelict boat to save money to save money is dyeing a slow death in this country,


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## Sailormon6 (May 9, 2002)

Marinas just don't want dilapidated boats in their slips or on the hard for another reason. If the boat has no significant value, the owner won't hesitate to walk away from it, leaving it to the marina operator to dispose of it at the marina's expense. I saw one such abandoned boat sink in the slip and saw another on the hard that was chainsawed to get rid of it, both at considerable expense to the marina, not to mention the unpaid fees accumulated while the marina took the legal steps to declare them abandoned. Marinas don't want to provide services to boats in which the owners have little financial interest.


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## Solandri (Sep 7, 2012)

SV Moondog said:


> Here in California they address the issue by raising the slip fees so high that few even legitimate cruisers can afford them much less homeless people. You can't find much gorilla mooring here in Southern California with the exception of maybe the back bay at Wilmington. People looking for a reasonable live aboard slip will find themselves in Oxnard/Ventura which is a good drive from any jobs on So Cal and even those marinas want to see what your boat looks like before they'll rent you a slip. Living on a derelict boat to save money to save money is dyeing a slow death in this country,


The U.S. West coast doesn't have as many natural harbors as the East coast, so slip fees here are naturally much higher to begin with. Still, I'm not sure I'd call the people who do this "homeless". They usually have money and decent jobs, and could've found an apartment if they really wanted. Just at their price range the apartment would be in a bad part of town or really far away. A boat in a marina offers a nice, scenic local, albeit in rather cramped quarters.

I know they did have a problem with derelict boats in the moorings at Newport Beach, CA. The moorings were owned by the city (or maybe the county, I don't recall), but the leases could be transferred to another person of your choice. That was intended to allow things like a parent to transfer a mooring to a child when the child inherited the boat, but got abused horribly. The waiting list was over a decade long, meaning occupying a mooring spot became an asset. People were offering their leases for sale for $30k-$40k. To keep a mooring, the city required you to actually have a boat moored there. Resulting in a lot of derelict vessels being tied up at moorings which were simply being used as investments, to be sold years later after prices appreciated.

The city completely overhaled the mooring leases a few years back. You can no longer transfer mooring leases to someone else. When you vacate a spot, the next person on the waiting list gets your spot. You have no say in who gets it. And I think they added a clause saying any moored boats had to be inspected annually and deemed seaworthy. That completely thwarted anyone trying to use them as an investment.


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## Sal Paradise (Sep 14, 2012)

I will give the OP a little sympathy. He's raising the point that operational cruisers are having a hard time finding space because of factors like the housing crisis, derelict boats, etc. The housing market is so powerful economically that it can tilt many scales, and the supply of cheap non operational boats seems endless.

We don't have this exact problem in New York so much but we have a similar problem in that there isn't much available dockage, and many marinas are expensive and over stressed.

I am an architect an also on my town planning board and listen to many sides of the housing crisis. I don't have a ready made solution to offer but its a national problem and should be solved by the Feds working with states. Amateur social scientists and political hacks not needed. I share the fear of conservatives who would argue that the government will only screw things up. But I think we are morally bound to try, and I think tax credits, cheap financing for apartments and starter houses, and affordable housing legislation would be a good start. Its wandering into politics so I am going to leave it here. I feel that in spite of the potential pitfalls and all our very real flaws - we have to try. If we focused on our flaws and differences during WW2 we'd all be speaking German now.


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## DougH (Aug 9, 2020)

I was a bit dumbfounded by the number of posts chastising the OP for being elitist or not understanding the plight of the poor or whatever. Give me a break. If that is really your position then sell your boat and donate the money to the homeless. Allow broken down old RVs to be parked in your yard. Etc.

The OP simply pointed out a real problem for those trying to cruise short or long distances from their home slip. I see his problem and agree that it is a problem that needs a solution. Derelict non-sailing boats parked permanently in marina slips is not a proper solution to any problem. Instead it creates multiple problems, including ruining boat cruising in parts of the US.


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## Sailormon6 (May 9, 2002)

Homelessness is merely one consequence of a far bigger problem that pervades every level of society. People in every class of society have become selfish, self-centered and hedonistic, and they expect far more of government than government is able to provide. In my youth, family members bore the responsibility for educating their children, supporting their elders and providing security for their own retirement. Parents paid for their childrens' college education. Now, parents keep that money, use it to buy a bigger, more luxurious house and car, and let their children borrow away their future with staggering debt. When they finally realize what a horrible thing they have done to their children, instead of doing the right thing and helping them repay the loans, they connive with venal politicians to have the government extinguish the debt at the expense of the taxpayer. Thus, the elderly, who have already paid to educate their children, and the childless, must share the burden of educating some other parents' children, so those other parents can afford a bigger house and car.

Burdened by that debt at the outset of their earning years, when they can least afford it, children have no hope that they'll ever be able to live up to the standard of their parents, and they see themselves as failures. Many try to escape their disillusionment with drugs and alcohol, but that is only digging a deeper hole. When they can no longer support their family, the family breaks apart, and one or both parents becomes homeless, and hopeless.

This is certainly not the only reason for the sharp rise in homelessness. Hopelessness, regardless of the underlying cause, promotes homelessness.

The remedy is not building more houses. That doesn't address the cause of homelessness. The cause of homelessness is hopelessness. Government money can't buy a cure to hopelessness.

I believe the ultimate remedy lies in restoring a sense of responsibility in the family, to educate their own children, to support their own elders, and to live within their means.

Society should regard it as unacceptable for any family to fail in it's responsibilities. That failure should be a source of shame. That concept should be taught in the schools, preached from the pulpit and espoused in the press.

Many parents could extinguish much of their child's college loan debt merely by selling their $60,000. Corvette.


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## Solandri (Sep 7, 2012)

Sailormon6 said:


> In my youth, family members bore the responsibility for educating their children, supporting their elders and providing security for their own retirement. Parents paid for their childrens' college education. Now, parents keep that money, use it to buy a bigger, more luxurious house and car, and let their children borrow away their future with staggering debt. When they finally realize what a horrible thing they have done to their children, instead of doing the right thing and helping them repay the loans, they connive with venal politicians to have the government extinguish the debt at the expense of the taxpayer.


While I agree this happens, the fundamental cause of the burgeoning student debt is the easy availability of loans. You can tell it's not entirely parents' fault because the rate at which tuitions have been increasing far, far outstrips the rate of inflation. i.e. Even if parents were behaving exactly the same, it would still be happening.

What happened is that in a well-intentioned but misguided attempt to make education affordable for more people, Congress made it easier for students to get loans. Doing that increased the overall pool of money that students could afford to pay (a loan shifts your future earnings into the present, allowing you to pay more in the present, but less in the future). Increased demand + unchanged supply = higher prices. So tuitions rose, and colleges and universities simply sopped up all the extra money generated from loans by raising tuition.

Loans are a demand-side solution to a problem. By providing more money, you increase demand. And increasing demand with no change in supply results in increasing prices. Yes more students get to go to college, but supply ends up lagging and chasing that increased demand, leading to higher prices.

What we should be doing is ending all student loan programs, and changing them to loan programs for people wishing to start new colleges, and for colleges wishing to expand their campuses (with receipt of the loan contingent on permanent increases to the number of students they accept every year). That's a supply-side solution. Increased supply with unchanged demand results in lower prices. Demand ends up lagging and chasing that increased supply, but as it catches up more students are able to go to college (because of the lower prices).



> The remedy is not building more houses. That doesn't address the cause of homelessness. The cause of homelessness is hopelessness. Government money can't buy a cure to hopelessness.


I live by a harbor and walk my dog at many of the surrounding parks every day. I see two main classes of homeless, split roughly 50/50.

The mentally ill. This dates back to the 1980s. Prior to Reagan, the U.S. had a system of federally funded mental hospitals (aka mental institutions aka insane asylums). Reagan surmised, probably correctly, that this was not within the scope of the Federal government's duties - there is nothing in the Constitution which remotely justifies operating mental hospitals. And if something isn't outlined as being a duty of the Federal government in the Constitution, it falls to the states. So he had funding for mental institutions stripped from the Federal budget, with the intent that the states would continue funding them. The states dropped the ball, resulting in these hospitals closing and hundreds of thousands of mentally ill people being dumped on the streets.
The down on their luck. Whether through poor financial management, misfortune, or accident, they ended up homeless. These people generally are able and capable of working, and many of them in fact desperately want to work. It's just that the stigma associated with homelessness (association with the mentally ill and drug addicts) makes it harder for them to get a job or qualify for housing.
The first group is probably a lost cause, and in fact government money will probably be the only way to address them. Get states to re-open the mental institutions and lock them up there. Anyone addicted to drugs to the extent that they cannot care for themselves probably qualifies as mentally ill, and under 24/7 supervision and treatment maybe they might finally break their addiction and return to being a productive member of society.

The second group has a variety of causes and possible remedies. But you're correct that government money is the worst way to address it - that's another demand-side solution. And just like with student loans, it will only result in housing prices spiraling higher making homes even less affordable to more people. In the last 70 years, families have switched from mostly single income to dual income. In theory the extra money from the second income should've made housing easier to afford. But what's happened instead, as with student loans, is that housing prices have simply increased to soak up the extra money from the second income. Making housing less affordable to anyone trying to buy a home on a single income. This combined with dropping marriage rates is why things look so hopeless for more young people wishing to buy a home.

The trick then is to come up with a way to make homes more affordable, without driving up home prices further. It's actually a more difficult problem than sending students to college. A student only wants/needs to go to college once. After they have their degree, they have no further need to go to college, and they mostly drop out of the demand side of the equation. But with homes, if you're financially successful, you can buy more than one home. In fact you can buy a lot of homes and rent them out, whether to permanent renters or airbnb-style. So after someone buys a home, they do not necessarily drop out of the demand side of the equation. They can continue to exert upward pressure on home prices.

The only idea I've been able to come up with to address this is to divide home ownership into two tiers. The upper tier would operate much as homes are bought and sold now. The lower tier would be housing built in areas zoned exclusively for owner-occupied first-time home buyers (much like 55+ retirement communities limit who can buy). These homes should be small and not fantastic (to encourage people to move out when they're able), but effective and functional. Limiting the buyers to first-timers eliminates most of the money from successful people who can afford multiple homes, thus preventing them from bidding up the prices on these entry-level homes. (First-time buyers who became successful early or inherited large amounts of money would qualify, but hopefully the small size of the homes would discourage them from buying there.)

The flip side of paying less when buying is that you'll receive less when you sell. But I suspect that is just fine with most first-time home buyers - they don't want a McMansion, they're not looking at the home as an investment. They just want a simple, effective, and reasonably priced place where they can live so they can start building up a wealth nest egg, instead of throwing money away as rent every month.


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## Don L (Aug 8, 2008)

Mostly all I want is for them to clean the boat topside of trash, maybe wash the outside of the boat once in a while, not get into drunken screaming contests (mostly at each other, put trash into the dumpster, and not "borrow" stuff.


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## Burninern (Sep 2, 2014)

Crewm8 said:


> I jokingly call many of them "****aboards"


I was talking to a guy who said in his experience MOST live-aboards' boats never leave the slip. Also, I'm still trying to figure out what "****aboards" is...


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## Don L (Aug 8, 2008)

Liveaboards are people living on a boat, which probably hasn't moved in years, who have shore life and jobs.etc. The only real difference between and a dirt dweller is they live on a boat instead of a house/apartment


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## Minnewaska (Feb 21, 2010)

Another perspective. While I know derelict year round live aboard problems exist in warmer climates, I bet our seasonal liveaboards take better care of the place than the weekend warriors. Just last weekend, I found myself tipping up all the dock carts so they wouldn’t catch rain. Maybe it was the stinkpotters.

There is certainly an argument that the low income default housing population has been priced out of the joint. I’ll try to remind myself of that feature when I get my slip invoice next winter. 

I knew a great beer, burger and wing joint, many years ago (30+), where the local Hell’s Angel’s chapter would rent their back room, routinely. No idea what they were doing, but we all called it their monthly club meeting. When done, they’d all be out at the bar. They never caused any trouble or harassed anyone, but not good for business, when they were there. The owner couldn’t ask them to leave though. One day, he remodeled the place from a dart, hole in the wall burger and cold beer joint, into a Martha Stewart, flowers and curtains everywhere, cartoon. Same menu, higher prices. They never came back.


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## Crewm8 (Feb 18, 2008)

MikeOReilly said:


> Mind if I ask why they're not doing likewise on the west coast? Oversupply of slips, or regulation discouraging it, or something?


In California it's regulated by the CA Coastal Commission. They dictate in most marinas a maximum of 6% liveaboard. Most marinas operate at near full capacity. Some, especially the small ones in smaller ports have wait lists for slips. In every marina there's a waitlist years long for liveaboard.

The issue then becomes "homeless" who aren't boaters utilizing limited space intended for boaters. I am all for housing people, but when you're on a dock, the priority should always go to those who use it for its intended purpose. It's a huge problem in southern latitudes because there are SO MANY people living on old boats with no intention of every using them for anything other than an apartment that it prevents you from cruising. There's no space in every marina you go to. Every harbormaster handles it different but it's incredible, the increase in demand lately thanks to covid, especially.


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## s_ruffner (Aug 5, 2019)

Don L said:


> Liveaboards are people living on a boat, which probably hasn't moved in years, who have shore life and jobs.etc. The only real difference between and a dirt dweller is they live on a boat instead of a house/apartment


I dunno, all the liveaboards I currently know (on the Chesapeake) are full-time cruisers and retired. They've got a home base. Of course, they also don't have junked-up boats that will never move (ie, they're not the liveaboards people are complaining about).


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## Don L (Aug 8, 2008)

That's great, but limited. There are lots of "cruisers" who haven't moved in years. But once you stop moving, get a land job, have the marina as your mailing address you aren't really cruising anymore.


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## Pamlicotraveler (Aug 13, 2006)

I have been in marinas where there are lots of liveaboards, and I find it a mixed bag. Yes, sometimes the boats are crapped up and basically just dilapidated RVs that never move, but others are nice boats. If they are good people they can be good to have around. They walk up and down the docks and are likely to keep theft and other crime to a minimum. The marina managers just need to know who they are letting in.


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## rbrasi (Mar 21, 2011)

To answer the OP, Marina Del Rey in Los Angeles has plenty of availability. While there is a HUGE homeless problem in neighboring Venice, it hasn't changed anything here. Some marinas don't allow boats over a certain age, regardless of condition. The only issue we have had is people running discreet BnBs out of their boat, which brings a whole other lever of douchebaggery.


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## MikeOReilly (Apr 12, 2010)

Crewm8 said:


> The issue then becomes "homeless" who aren't boaters utilizing limited space intended for boaters. I am all for housing people, but when you're on a dock, the priority should always go to those who use it for its intended purpose. It's a huge problem in southern latitudes because there are SO MANY people living on old boats with no intention of every using them for anything other than an apartment that it prevents you from cruising. There's no space in every marina you go to. Every harbormaster handles it different but it's incredible, the increase in demand lately thanks to covid, especially.


Yes, well, as I said up-thread, homelessness is a complex societal problem that we all have a stake in. We can all do a tiny bit by voting for the right politicians. But regardless, I remain uncomfortable with the idea of prioritizing my need to cruise over someone else's need to live somewhere.

If that is truly what is going on, then pushing these otherwise homeless people out will just drive them somewhere else. And whose to say their use is _lesser_ than mine? As long as they are abiding by the rules of the marina, and paying all their bills, what right have we to say what is 'proper usage'?

I don't cruise in California, so I don't know how things work there, but to me, a busy marina is irrelevant to cruising. I might stop in for fuel and water. Otherwise, I'm out there. I'm swinging from my own anchor. When I'm cruising, the last thing I want to see is a marina.


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## Salty_Sculptor (Oct 22, 2020)

Crewm8 said:


> My story is similar to many but I've noticed a trend over the last 10 years that I believe is now crippling, in many places, the very essence of this sport and industry. The pressure put on marinas from the recent increase in homelessness.
> 
> After spending time working on the boat, my wife and I moved aboard like many of us. Also like many, our dream of sailing entailed learning, in our case through the ASA, practicing with other sailors, spending years gaining knowledge about the myriad of boat systems, perfecting brightwork, etc. We enjoy the art and activity of sailing with all it entails, we're constantly learning and working on the boat to varying degrees. We take pride in our old boat and maintain it.
> 
> ...


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## Salty_Sculptor (Oct 22, 2020)

This is an old rant… yet, you want to live aboard in a marina… waaaahh.


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## Sal Paradise (Sep 14, 2012)

Solandri said:


> While I agree this happens, the fundamental cause of the burgeoning student debt is the easy availability of loans. You can tell it's not entirely parents' fault because the rate at which tuitions have been increasing far, far outstrips the rate of inflation. i.e. Even if parents were behaving exactly the same, it would still be happening.
> 
> What happened is that in a well-intentioned but misguided attempt to make education affordable for more people, Congress made it easier for students to get loans. Doing that increased the overall pool of money that students could afford to pay (a loan shifts your future earnings into the present, allowing you to pay more in the present, but less in the future). Increased demand + unchanged supply = higher prices. So tuitions rose, and colleges and universities simply sopped up all the extra money generated from loans by raising tuition.
> 
> ...


I know I am wandering way to close to policitics, but I have a real problem with this. Its ultra simplistic right wing thinking. Many other countries subsidize education - Germany, for nstance subsidizes education and training for its citizens. I don't hear from Germans complaining about runaway education inflation.

The supply and demand for college education in the US is far more influenced by what employment opportunities exist. If people think the only path to a good paying job is education, they will pay more and more for college. Thats what has effected the demand for degrees in the US. And politicians of all stripes have jumped on that bandwagon. " Stay in school" is such a common phrase its a joke.

I am going to try and salvage my post here by talking about sailing. Right now the trades are paying a great wage, and in big metro areas plumbers sheetrockers, electricians can easily make enough money to buy a sailboat and go cruising. It wasn't always this way, it won't last forever, but right now its one very good way to earn the money for a boat.


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## Blewtooth (Nov 21, 2018)

I remember Florida in the 90s and the issues with "floating" homelessness was a problem but was also mitigated by a lot of the "old codger" retirees who were relentless in trying to drive them out. There was a bunch of senior condo association members constantly calling the cops on some old beat up boat with a crack smoking livaboard who even tried using a couple of cinder blocks for an anchor when he lost his danforth because he had bent on a yellow ski rope that was so rotten that it parted after a couple of days.
The problem is that these folks are so outraged at these guys that they start passing draconian anchoring laws and take it out on legitimate Cruisers and that is why these homeless irresponsible crack people are messing up cruising everywhere. These boats wind-up sinking and causing issues with the DNR. I really think it's going to get worse if homelessness increases and plus they are dangerous neighbors for other reasons such as security and Sanitation.
But overall not much we can do about it without losing something from our cruising lifestyle.


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## Minnewaska (Feb 21, 2010)

Sal Paradise said:


> Germany, for nstance subsidizes education and training for its citizens


I believe that's only the case, or perhaps there are extra benefits, if one pursues a specific degree they determine they need as a society. You don't get to major in Octoberfest. That's a smart way of going about it. One has to have the aptitude and interest in a productive field.

The number of kids that go to college in the US and switch majors to something useless, just to get the degree, is indeed daunting. Then they graduate with their sociology or psychology degree, with zero interest in either field, and can't find a job to pay their loans. Education is critical, but our approach is a disaster. 

When I graduated college, my first apartment with my first job was pretty low end and I didn't have a nickle left over after paying all my bills. However, it was mine and I didn't share it with 4-6 other filthy frat boy dudes. It was a step up in my standard of living, from college. When my kids went to college, they virtually attended a country club, by comparison. They won't re-achieve that collegiate standard of living for a decade or more. 20-25 years later, I paid 10-15 times more for their education than mine. It's broken.


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## Don L (Aug 8, 2008)

Blewtooth said:


> But overall not much we can do about it without losing something from our cruising lifestyle.


the boat scum that are the source of the problem has nothing to do with cruising life style other than there is a boat involved


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## DougH (Aug 9, 2020)

Minnewaska said:


> It's broken.


I agree completely. I worked as a motorcycle mechanic and as a student assistant in the campus library to pay for my tuition. I lived at home and commuted to save money. My degree in mechanical engineering has served well as an occupation enabler and has afforded my family a good quality of life. I was able to send both of my sons to U of M and pay fully out-of-my-pocket their tuition and room and board in Ann Arbor. That might have been a mistake. Neither son talks to me much anymore because they know I'm a Trump supporter.

I am stunned by the cost of a college 4-year degree today compared to back in the day. As Minnewaska says, "it's broken". Where is all that money going? I once tried to figure that out and it looked like the colleges today are extremely top heavy in grossly overpaid administrators. This needs to be fixed.

I don't care how they do it in other countries. This isn't just another "other country". I have seen our system work at one time but now it is broken. Free college? Who will repay to me what I paid (hundreds of thousands of dollars) for my kids' educations? 

After free college then what? Free houses? Free food? Free cars? Free sailboats?


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## Minnewaska (Feb 21, 2010)

DougH said:


> Neither son talks to me much anymore because they know I'm a Trump supporter.


While I do not support him, it saddens me to hear of families being torn apart by this. The tone has been inflamed to no productive end.



DougH said:


> Where is all that money going?


It‘s clearly going to two very distinct things. 

First, they are competing for demand with amenities and upgraded programs. Parents, for the most part, let the kids decide which school they go to (assuming they are accepted to more than one). Kids filters are grossly uneducated. Nice gyms, dorms, new computer science buildings, etc, sell. My daughter refused to go to one very good school, because she didn’t like the kid that did our tour. The biggest art form in college admissions isn’t who they accept, it’s how many of them chose to actually attend, when accepted at several schools.

The other is that anyone who can afford to borrow money to go to school is paying a higher tuition in order that the school can afford to give tuition away to those who really can’t afford it. While there is a logic to it, the approach is clearly unsustainable. While folks get all antsy about taking from the rich to give to the poor, there simply aren’t enough rich people to pay for all the poor tuition at these prices. It‘s a runway meltdown. We do need to lift up society and provide opportunity, but it’s being done unintelligently. There is far more to success than simply getting a random degree in something one doesn’t care about. 

The correlation to college educated people having better income and employment outcomes is true, but it’s not solely the degree. It’s their family, their mentors, their aptitude, their work ethic, not just the paper on the wall.


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## s_ruffner (Aug 5, 2019)

Warning: Thread Drift and somewhat...loaded? In any case, certainly in response to some very loaded commentary.



Minnewaska said:


> When my kids went to college, they virtually attended a country club, by comparison. They won't re-achieve that collegiate standard of living for a decade or more. 20-25 years later, I paid 10-15 times more for their education than mine. It's broken.


I think I'm likely a decade younger than most of the people commenting on this, which I mostly base on having a sort-of-similar experience, but more because of the absolute cluelessness of the commentary - and I mean that very kindly - it's people commenting about something applying their perception and "local knowledge" from a minimum of three decades ago. I am aware of the difference because I work for (and have for nearly my entire career) an R-1 major state university (and I am a STEM person - Chemistry and then Engineering, and I now do computational chemistry, physics, medicine, etc. - all what some would call "productive" pursuits - and your bias and disdain is well on display), and I'm well aware of the changes in that school (since I was a student) in both terms of "Quality of Life" and costs/budgets. 

I concur the "system is broken" but the current system - versus the one that existed in the 50s-70s (I attended in the second half of the 80s) - is entirely the result of a "free market" approach to higher education. In the 50s-70s, for reasons of national security (which are as relevant today as they were then), we had a socialist approach - heavily government subsidized - to higher education, because (think post-Sputnik particularly) it was readily accepted that these benefits redounded to the entire country, and that an all-hands effort apply (both in paying and in attending). In the 80s, that broke down, for really one reason: nobody wanted to pay taxes, and cuts had to go somewhere.

The single biggest driver of higher ed tuition inflation is very, very clearly the reduction of Federal and State funding support. Most of the "I paid my own way with my night job" crowd from the 60s and 70s really just have no idea how much of the school was being subsidized at the state and federal level. My school built a nuclear research reactor in the early 60s, a particle accelerator and massive centrifuges (the father of ultracentrifuges was chair of the physics dept.), all of which are capital expenditures we couldn't even dream of touching today - the continual decrease in federal research funding (the research on which American private enterprise is built, BTW) would never permit anything like this. Symbolically, I got to use the reactor as a student for some very simple experiments to learn first hand how these things were done, although nothing about any of the major research I'm describing has anything to do with undergraduate education (the other common source of confusion for people too far outside of higher ed for too long have), very briefly before it became too expensive to maintain and was decommissioned. So I know about the "good old days" and also about now at a gut level. 

States also heavily subsidized their major state universities, recognizing them as engines of economic growth - cf. the RTP in NC, and heck, all of Boston. Families in the post-war era supported this politically, because yeah, it helped pay for their kids education. So congratulations to everyone who got socialist subsidized college tuition! I too was fortunate that the inflation hadn't gotten quite so bad (there were still subsidies), and was able to have a full-time job at night to pay for my living expenses, tuition and provided health insurance.

However, in classic pull-up-the-ladder behavior, that support dried up. And costs got shifted. Even for large state schools who tried aggressively to hold down tuition costs, eventually the *real costs that always existed* got pushed back onto users (students). Very "fee for service", very free-market. Education is not widget production (please note the near total failure of the MOOC scam), and is hugely labor intensive. It also involves highly skilled labor. You want that, you pay. You especially pay for what many would deem "productive" talents and degrees - the humanities that people like to dunk on are actually less expensive to provide, and also very undervalued.

So, parents are suddenly coughing up more dough...sometimes a lot more dough. They visit the campus, and see 50s era/style dining halls and dorms and they balk or walk. Schools have to offer nicer amenities to attract students who can pay. They get into an arms race of amenities, and while amenities are not the real driver of why schools are expensive (it's all that highly skilled labor), they do become mandatory. I'm sure if they were the real driver of costs, and we could eliminate them and then offer a degree that is 60s-era out of pocket for students, there would be a market niche. But you can eliminate them and you won't get that cheap tuition. We do have a thing very much like that, though, and it's by leaps and bounds the absolute best value - an amazing value, but also heavily subsidized by the government - for undergraduate education known as Community College. No amenities, no frills classrooms, not R-1 researchers (so a little less skilled labor, and therefore cheaper, but often better at teaching).

This gets to the core thing that people really misunderstand about "college" (into which all forms of higher education are mostly lumped except for the trade schools like Law, Med and MBA) - there is a huge diversity of types of institutions. The cost drivers are wildly different, but to be clear: for well over 35% of the four year schools, undergraduate education isn't the main "business" of the institution, and while the R-1 and R-2 schools could use research dollars and state support to subsidize the costs of undergraduate education in the past, they no longer can. The system is indeed broken, as evidenced by the collapse of private four year undergraduate schools - they are simply vanishing, at a truly remarkable rate - this is despite the flood of student loan money. The exception are the "degree mills" (which are notable for their very low graduation/degree awarding rates) which primarily serve as a vehicle for selling student debt, not education (cf. Liberty University, DeVry, ITT, etc.).

There has been an explosion, "inflation" in higher ed itself - the growth of what we in the biz snarkily call "deanlettes" - a proliferation of mid-level administrators - but this too is driven in response to demand - demand from parents first and foremost, and secondly by taxpayer/political "oversight". The amount of money spent overseeing and ensuring money isn't misspent is shocking, and entirely self-defeating (more is spent on administrative salaries overseeing, for example, travel reimbursements, than is saved making sure nobody is trying to rip off the state with bogus travel expenses). Similarly, most of these mid-level admin positions are there as a response to some public criticism. I think most people will tell you privately that they are superfluous and address problems that aren't actually substantial problems - or at least not best addressed by deanlettes - but these are in response to public demands, either directly or through the political process.

As in all things, people over-attribute personal agency to success (and not to personal failures), and ignore the amount of structural and societal support they enjoyed - I'm personally of the belief that most "success" is 30% growing up/being in a place where there is opportunity (not just educational, but market/business), 30% is dumb luck, and 30% is personal agency. Successful people never really want to talk all that much about the dumb luck part, and only sparingly about the opportunity part. I'm a hard-science person, so I like models that actually account for all the variables, not just the self-serving Horatio Alger stuff. Attitudes about schools and taxation tend to be absolutely rife with this kind of myopia.


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## s_ruffner (Aug 5, 2019)

Minnewaska said:


> We do need to lift up society and provide opportunity, but it’s being done unintelligently.


I agree, it is very foolish - we try to let "the market demand" drive how we structure our schools, but as you noted about kids picking based on amenities, the market may not be very smart about what is most valuable. The market is often kind of dumb. Now we are forced to subsidize our education system by bringing in foreign nationals and training other countries' intellectual resources for them.



Minnewaska said:


> The correlation to college educated people having better income and employment outcomes is true, but it’s not solely the degree. It’s their family, their mentors, their aptitude, their work ethic, not just the paper on the wall.


About this you are completely incorrect. The correlation is that student academic achievement (at all levels) is powerfully correlated with parental academic achievement (not income or wealth), and that income and employment outcomes are highly correlated (and increasingly so) with just having a degree. Indeed, in the modern era where - for efficiency's sake - we have outsourced first pass HR employment filtering to "AI" (nb, I do AI), having a degree is a 0/1 pass/fail to even getting an interview. The humanities degree you are disparaging is paying off way more than you realize, for just this reason. There are very few fields in which - absent the punched ticket - the talented, hard-working even has access to the playing field. In the attempt to widgetize all HR and "human resources" ticket punching is becoming more and more important and powerful, which is why you see the rise of so many degree mills. It's very much starting to infect masters-level education.


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## s_ruffner (Aug 5, 2019)

Oh, and one final comment: free college - even at the Community College level is a _*terrible *_idea. Everybody involved needs some skin in the game, particularly students. There is a noticeable difference between kids/students who personally have some skin in the game and how seriously they take school. This was evident when I was a student, and is even more apparent to me now that I'm working with students in a different capacity. 

On both the question of homelessness and higher education, I think people want to find rationales/fables/just-so-stories that are comfortable and don't ask anything personally of them.


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## Don L (Aug 8, 2008)

you know what, I have never had a boater tell me that the reason they are living on a rundown derelict pos boat is that they have too much student loans!


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## s_ruffner (Aug 5, 2019)

Don L said:


> Mostly all I want is for them to clean the boat topside of trash, maybe wash the outside of the boat once in a while, not get into drunken screaming contests (mostly at each other, put trash into the dumpster, and not "borrow" stuff.


I mean: I like college students, but yeah, this is why I don't want to live next door to them....and a lot of them aren't poor.


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## Minnewaska (Feb 21, 2010)

s_ruffner said:


> The correlation is that student academic achievement (at all levels) is powerfully correlated with parental academic achievement


That's what I wrote.



s_ruffner said:


> income and employment outcomes are highly correlated (and increasingly so) with just having a degree.


This is a question of indirect variables. Of course, the higher achievers also have higher degrees. That does not mean a higher degree is what drove those results. If all one has is a liberal arts degree and no drive, talent, mentors, family support, willingness to take some risk and the resolve to take a few punches and get back up, the degree won't overcome it. 

We should both move back to sailing contributions.


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## Sal Paradise (Sep 14, 2012)

Minnewaska said:


> I believe that's only the case, or perhaps there are extra benefits, if one pursues a specific degree they determine they need as a society. You don't get to major in Octoberfest. That's a smart way of going about it. One has to have the aptitude and interest in a productive field.
> 
> The number of kids that go to college in the US and switch majors to something useless, just to get the degree, is indeed daunting. Then they graduate with their sociology or psychology degree, with zero interest in either field, and can't find a job to pay their loans. Education is critical, but our approach is a disaster.
> 
> When I graduated college, my first apartment with my first job was pretty low end and I didn't have a nickle left over after paying all my bills. However, it was mine and I didn't share it with 4-6 other filthy frat boy dudes. It was a step up in my standard of living, from college. When my kids went to college, they virtually attended a country club, by comparison. They won't re-achieve that collegiate standard of living for a decade or more. 20-25 years later, I paid 10-15 times more for their education than mine. It's broken.



On vacation down in the islands a few years ago we fell in with another couple for a few days. The husband was a Luftansa Pilot and he told me how all his training was basicaly free, including his degree. My son is a commercial pilot getting ready for his ATP and I have seen him pay his dues to get to 1500 hours. I don't know why we seem to make it a point that our people have to be at such a disadvantage all the time. And I'd rather have an american flight crew up front when I fly.

The college cost I believe soar when people are desperate for jobs and flock to colleges as a way to one up the competition.


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## StarTracker (Dec 26, 2021)

The fundamental issue with live boards is this:
Blanket rules are easy to enforce. Not fair or sensible but easy. 
NO LIVEABOARDS means none of the associated problems.
Liveaboards but only those who keep their boat up and don't cause problems is much harder. Who decides what makes a well kept boat? Who decides what kind of problems are enough? Who documents the frequency of problems and decides when it's time to kick them out? Who pays the lawyer for the process, and on and on.
The same issue with anchoring: Does anyone mind a well kept boat that doesn't dump **** in the ocean which is anchored on a correctly sized anchor and managed by a skipper who is thoughtful about weather, is proactive in repairs and maintenance and monitoring ground tackle for wear, plus carries insurance for the possibility of drifting ashore? With tidy decks?
I don't think so. 
But try to enforce those rules for anchoring and what do you get? People picking fights over unfair treatment of those on the margins of society. Arguments over what is a well kept boat. Expenses related to monitoring and enforcement, and practical issues such as how do you check they aren't crapping in the ocean? 
NO ANCHORING FOR MORE THAN x days. Problem solved. 
Ironically when I was first a live-aboard a long time ago, they chased all the good boats out of the anchorage, while simultaneously not having any live aboard legal slips available with less than a decade on the waitlist. I bitched about it to the police one day when they were floating by, and they answered that those people had nowhere else to go so didn't enforce the rules on them. Ironic since I too had nowhere else I could go, but I had a fully insured boat maintained to a decent standard, didn't discharge sewage, get drunk or high and fall over or have guests who did so on board. They told me to my face I could just work harder and afford a slip. But no slips were available that allowed live aboard, and I was a student working full time to eat, I couldn't afford a slip either. I Didn't throw appliances batteries and so forth over the side. Didn't use the public dinghy docks as a place for my dog to leave a poop. Didn't do break and enters or robberies. Didn't collect a variety of other floating junk to use as places to store more junk, and then cost the city tens and tens of thousands of dollars to dispose of my garbage when it ended up on the beach. Didn't regularly drift into docks or other boats because of cheap anchors. Unlike the people they let stay. Eventually only the worst boats were still there, and the rules changed again, because eventually only those who caused issues and didn't follow rules were left.
This process will only continue, as they chase out more and more decent boats and people who aren't major disruptors of others lives, people will see that anchor outs are nothing but problems, even though the rules they are creating essentially filter out those who aren't problems thus in a sense the rules they enforce now create the problems that result. When it was say a couple people in the anchorage who problems and lots who were not, there was an aspect of community enforcement. Those who created problems had neighbours who both helped them and applied pressure to not do bad things. Eliminating those people makes it worse. Look at places like Cadboro bay near Victoria, or Ganges on Saltspring for this in action today, or the seller over in False creek who gets free boats, then takes the good parts off and sells them to suckers, he not infrequently loses the bloody things causing expense and hassle for others. In Cadboro Bay both the police and the locals know who it is that steals dinghy engines in the middle of the night from the each club. They even know which boat the culprit lives on. They do nothing about it, and because there aren't so many anchor outs or live aboard at the yacht club, the problem is made worse not better. Liveaboards are the best free security in many cases. 

This problem is made worse by the costs of boat disposal. Say you have a worthless boat you want to get rid of. Proper disposal will cost you 100$ a foot or more. Selling it to a homeless person with substance or mental issues for 1$ costs you a dollar, and the city will eventually pick up the tab for disposal. 

That being said, everyone needs to live somewhere. The logical answer is to provide free, safe supportive housing for those who need it, they are usually the ones stealing/doing drugs/creating problems. If that housing existed, likely many of the problem people would move there and get at least some of the support they need. 
Having been homeless once myself I feel badly for them, but sympathy and acknowledgment of the issues caused are not mutually exclusive.


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## clark.d.brooks (11 mo ago)

In Portland OR, there is a full and diverse spectrum of people living on the rivers. My marina charges extra for live-aboard, but it is still much cheaper than apartment rent would be. The air gets to freezing in the winter, but the rivers don't freeze, so the winter squeeze is more for propane or shore power than universal haul-out. 
Some folks see the diversity as a problem ; I don't.


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## Dogscout (Jan 7, 2017)

This is a really great thread. I read the OP's post and what I took away from it is not that this is about homelessness. Its about taking up marina slips with boats that never move, thus eliminating others/sailors ability to use the marina for what it was built for. Marina slips are generally a finite thing and exist to support or promote boating. Not sitting. 

So the thread seems to me to have morphed into a discussion of the acceptable hierarchy of living aboard, and not the original concern immovable boats taking up marina slips that active boaters could use. Its very interesting to see how the thread wandered and who is, or isnt holier than thou. 

So yes I agree that non moveable boats should not take up limited marina slips. I also agree with the laws that you cant leave an unregistered broken down derelict car on the street, and I wish they were more regularly enforced. And my view has nothing to do with homelessness. 

I live aboard most of the year and my boat keeps moving, not staying in one place more than a couple of months and it is always maintained.


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## MikeOReilly (Apr 12, 2010)

Agreed Dog, this is not about homelessness. THAT is a far bigger issue than this little "first world problem" of not having enough marina spaces available. 

While I think it's reasonable to avoid having "derelict" boats taking up marina slips, or indeed anchorage space, there is sometimes a fine line here. A "derelict" to one person might be a perfectly fine vessel to another. Aesthetics are a fickle measure. Whether a boat can move under its own power is probably a good marker, but sometimes boats are under repair for length periods ... would that disqualify them for a slip space? 

The other consideration is the fact that most marinas are private businesses. If a business chooses to allow non-movable boats to take up slip space, obviously this must make business sense for the owners. After all, no one has a right to someone else's private property. And who's to say someone who just wants to live on board, but never move anywhere, doesn't deserve a slip as much as the boater who moves all the time?


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## Den (11 mo ago)

I’d say lifeaboards are a dying breed on the Great Lakes. In the Toronto area one winter basin was closed kicked all the boats out. The boats went scrambling for the only place left to bubble. Most clubs won’t allow live-a-boards for a long list of reasons. There is no wintering on Toronto Island due to emergency services getting access during winter. 
Covid apparently has driven many folks to buying cottages and boats. Great if you’re selling an old boat but sucks cause of slip shortage. 
In Port Credit is a large development underway which should give boaters a great destination but the city core still has very few if any day slips. The clubs trade slips and got musical chair sailing with a reserved slip waiting. 
Politics ....
2 clubs I know in the country will darn near shoot across your bow if you ask to stay there. 
The Lake Ontario Flood of 2017 and 2019 took out 5 visitor docks I know of then Covid where the clubs were half full. Both New York and Ontario marinas and clubs were damaged. 
I think it will take a few years to recover.


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## Northernease (10 mo ago)

Hi Den,
I have just joined and saw your post. As somebody who is thinking of buying a boat, at some point, I am very interested. Would you have any more information/advice re. where to look for? I am not interested in liveaboard, but I would love to find a place where I can be on my boat for a week or two, during the summer, if I want to.
Thanks!
Andy


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## Don L (Aug 8, 2008)

Been on the move the last week in Florida. I can 99% say that homelessness isn't doing anything far as cruisers go. But delict boats anchored in good spots that prevent cruisers in transient using that spot is definitely an issue. Still!


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## Den (11 mo ago)

Andy for a week you can go almost anywhere. When folks go cruising clubs rent their slips. So call QCYC, North, Etobicoke, Toronto Island Yacht Club, for visitor slips or season. IToronto Island Yacht Club is really nice. Two locations. The new acquisition is the east one. It was a closed club they took over. They have a swimming pool and great grounds. I have no idea about Ontario place. One day they have visitor slips the next day they are closing it. No idea. If you are day sailing off a trailer there you can trailer truck parking and launch ramp on the Humber spit. All no charge. 
The Basin right near the western gap will rent you a week. They have washrooms three washing machines and the wall slips have no power. Sucks large. 
Muggs Channel Wards Island. Government park docks $35.00 a night power water picnic tables. Clothing option beach short walk through trees. Arrive on weekend you’ll never get a spot. Leave a dinghy on your tie up. 
If you end up on the island you’ll find it an overdose of relaxation. The QCYC is a short walk to Wards Island Dance hall way down the opposite end of the island. Absolutely great outdoor bars. Either end of the island has a ferry into the city. The island has zero stores but great places to eat. 
Otter Taxi can drop you off to shop. Wednesday nights in the harbour is like a sailing ballet. Hope you enjoy your visit. 
Ps Niagara on the Lake is 37 kts south. 

Muggs Channel and harbour


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## Northernease (10 mo ago)

Thank you for the advice and pics, Den! Do you know whether any of these clubs have space for the season and winter haul-out? I actually live in Toronto and have sailed here for several years but, due to an accident, I haven't been able to sail for the past six years so I am a bit out of the loop. Also, do you know anything about clubs in Port Credit, by any chance?


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## Barquito (Dec 5, 2007)

Den said:


> Andy for a week you can go almost anywhere. When folks go cruising clubs rent their slips. So call QCYC, North, Etobicoke, Toronto Island Yacht Club, for visitor slips or season. IToronto Island Yacht Club is really nice. Two locations. The new acquisition is the east one. It was a closed club they took over. They have a swimming pool and great grounds. I have no idea about Ontario place. One day they have visitor slips the next day they are closing it. No idea. If you are day sailing off a trailer there you can trailer truck parking and launch ramp on the Humber spit. All no charge.
> The Basin right near the western gap will rent you a week. They have washrooms three washing machines and the wall slips have no power. Sucks large.
> Muggs Channel Wards Island. Government park docks $35.00 a night power water picnic tables. Clothing option beach short walk through trees. Arrive on weekend you’ll never get a spot. Leave a dinghy on your tie up.
> If you end up on the island you’ll find it an overdose of relaxation. The QCYC is a short walk to Wards Island Dance hall way down the opposite end of the island. Absolutely great outdoor bars. Either end of the island has a ferry into the city. The island has zero stores but great places to eat.
> ...


Are Canadian boats required to have the name on the top-sides? Just thought I would ask seeing those boats lined up.


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## Den (11 mo ago)

I’d call Toronto Yacht Club, Port Credit Yacht Club, Etobicoke Yacht Club, Queens City Yacht club real quick. 
Port Credit has a major expansion going on. May be the best destination in the area. Queen City has a railway but the winter storage may be full. Many winter on the mainland. 
Port Credit winters boats at the club. I’m sure construction will create some inconvenience. 
Name on the boat can be a massive debate because no where in you Provincial boating education does it come up except “PORT” on the Stern Number on the front. 
The law to show the boats name port starboard and Stern with Port Name, is very and required for all boats is very old. There was no distinction between commercial boats and the few pleasure boats when it was penned. 
Out of sheer tradition I can’t see it going away. In the US some state have the bow name law. For safety and racing it’s very important. You’ll find Up State New York Boats with bow names below their number. 
Power boats have the closer to the helm or in both places depending on their size. So yes but the police don’t care.


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## Northernease (10 mo ago)

Thank you again Den! Who knows, perhaps one day we'll meet on the water!


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## jtsailjt (Aug 1, 2013)

Like you, my boat is also almost always on a mooring or anchored out and that’s the sort of cruising and living aboard I much prefer too. I also have never cruised the California coast but I have looked at a chart of California. Try it. How many decent anchorages do you see?! My point is that west coast cruisers, unlike you and I who cruise in areas where anchorages are plentiful, in many areas don’t have the option of a mooring or anchoring out. So they are forced to resort to staying at a marina much of the time. Therefore I can understand why it would be annoying to repeatedly be told that “there’s no room at the inn for you” because people who aren’t even boaters and whose cluttered and neglected looking boats never leave their slip have taken up all the spots. And apparently the problem can’t be solved as you suggest by moving on to the next harbor or marina because the same conditions exist there. So, though I haven’t personally encountered the problem that the OP described, I can empathize because I know how frustrated I’d feel if every time I sailed into a favorite harbor or anchorage to anchor for the night I found that the whole anchorage was full of junky liveaboard boats that never moved. Maybe there’s no law against that sort of thing and those people have just as much legal right as anyone else to anchor there, but from my perspective it becomes a problem when there are so many of them that it prevents actual cruisers from being able to find a place to anchor for the night.


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## Den (11 mo ago)

Guess I’m lucky. The few live aboard folks I know are sweethearts. One in particulate is a family and they are spotless and a huge asset to the club they are in. Do they use the facilities more than we do? Yup. Transient slips are in short supply and seasonal slips are fair prices.


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## MikeOReilly (Apr 12, 2010)

Northernease said:


> Hi Den,
> I have just joined and saw your post. As somebody who is thinking of buying a boat, at some point, I am very interested. Would you have any more information/advice re. where to look for? I am not interested in liveaboard, but I would love to find a place where I can be on my boat for a week or two, during the summer, if I want to.
> Thanks!
> Andy


Den's suggestions are all great. You could look further east along Lake Ontario (I assume this is where you're located). In the Bay of Quinte area you have Trenton and Belleville, both with marinas and lots of boats. And of course just beyond that is Kingston and the whole 1000 Islands. There are dozens of marinas and yacht clubs in this area.

I basically lived aboard at a marina in Belleville while repairing my engine. This same marina did allow winter liveaboards, but this was a few years ago now. Not sure if they still do this. I also spent months anchored in and around Quinte and the Islands. There's lots to explore.


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## jtsailjt (Aug 1, 2013)

StarTracker said:


> The fundamental issue with live boards is this:
> Blanket rules are easy to enforce. Not fair or sensible but easy.
> NO LIVEABOARDS means none of the associated problems.
> Liveaboards but only those who keep their boat up and don't cause problems is much harder. Who decides what makes a well kept boat? Who decides what kind of problems are enough? Who documents the frequency of problems and decides when it's time to kick them out? Who pays the lawyer for the process, and on and on.
> ...


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## jtsailjt (Aug 1, 2013)

Oops, tried to quote the above post which think raises some good points and is a pretty balanced perspective. I think a problem with this whole thread is that we’ve been mixing full time liveaboards who neglect their boats with homeless people who usually have mental health issues and are almost penniless. Those are 2 very different populations and we should try to focus on what the OP described which are people who are taking up all the marina (or anchorage) space living on boats that don’t move. The issue of actual homeless people is also a serious problem but not one that has much direct impact on available marina space available for actual cruisers.


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## ShonkadiDJ (11 mo ago)

I'm afraid it's the people we vote for that are supposed to take care of our infrastructure and opportunities and provide us with services as such. The ones we pay taxes for to make sure we'll leave the land connected to those ports and services at sea a little better when we leave than it was when we arrived. I think we as democratic free people didn't take very good care of the institutions that allowed us to come up with these ideas of freedom and now seats have been taken over by people who abuse them in such a way that we begin to feel it in every element of our lives. Whoever they are, they seem to be successful in making us see and point out a lot of differences and make us think about what others should or should not be allowed. To be clear; what others, not what we...

I'm struck by the finding of this thread in a forum like sailnet. I didn't check what Ontopic topic this belongs to but i can understand you need some help wrapping your head around what is happening to you. I can only let you know you are not alone. You seem to realize already it's the situation others had happening in their lives that pushes them to look for solutions and this is one of them. I think you are right about that.

I am glad for me it's a combination of being pushed in a direction I did not want to go any further and a dream I have had all my life. My move is voluntary and i would not have thought about it if the situation on land was better. If there is anything I would like to see change, it would be to see my fellow free and democratic citizens grow up and take responsibility for future generations. And I don't mean by supporting people who cry about things in the media but by any means necessary. But I have been saying that for over fifteen years. Glad to see it is becoming clear to the masses in every part of society. I will not stop doing what I can to change things for the better like the wing of the butterfly that will cause the storm, for as much it has ever been proven to work in that way .

And as long as things are under pressure of the dark side and it's forces inside us, I will 'be like water'. May the Force be with you.


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## Don L (Aug 8, 2008)

jtsailjt said:


> I think a problem with this whole thread is that we’ve been mixing full time liveaboards who neglect their boatsa with homeless people who usually have mental health issues and are almost penniless.


Sorry but to high content those are the same people.


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## Den (11 mo ago)

Yes Mike the East end of the lake is the jewel. I have done a lot of scuba diving on historic wrecks in the area. I’ve travelled the Trent Severn in a power boat. Georgian Bay south and North Channels I know a couple hundred places to hide. 
We are a lucky bunch with clean bottoms and less corrosion.


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## MikeOReilly (Apr 12, 2010)

Den said:


> Yes Mike the East end of the lake is the jewel. I have done a lot of scuba diving on historic wrecks in the area. I’ve travelled the Trent Severn in a power boat. Georgian Bay south and North Channels I know a couple hundred places to hide.
> We are a lucky bunch with clean bottoms and less corrosion.


Lucky indeed, and largely without the issues faced by the OP. As I said in my very first response on this thread back in Aug 2021, up here on the Great Lakes, this issue of derelict boats just isn't. Winter haul out pretty much makes this impossible, and we just don't have the population density to generate many of these problems.


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## LaPoodella (Oct 5, 2018)

Crewm8 said:


> My story is similar to many but I've noticed a trend over the last 10 years that I believe is now crippling, in many places, the very essence of this sport and industry. The pressure put on marinas from the recent increase in homelessness.
> 
> After spending time working on the boat, my wife and I moved aboard like many of us. Also like many, our dream of sailing entailed learning, in our case through the ASA, practicing with other sailors, spending years gaining knowledge about the myriad of boat systems, perfecting brightwork, etc. We enjoy the art and activity of sailing with all it entails, we're constantly learning and working on the boat to varying degrees. We take pride in our old boat and maintain it.
> 
> ...


I heard that in Santa Cruz, at least, the harbor has tried to eliminate this type of misuse by requiring the boats to move at regular intervals. But the waitlist for a slip is decades long and you have to pay to stay on the list. I actually think it has got better in the last few years. The boats in Santa Cruz that were dilapidated are gone. On the east coast, there are a lot more marinas and a lot more private ones. They are NOT cheaper than living on land. They have lots of requirements. FL changed their mooring laws and some dilapidated boats started anchoring and staying in the same place for years. Local governments had to petition the state to get local rules to govern mooring fields. The mooring fields weren’t that convenient though because there wasn’t any place to get to land nearby. There are few dinghy docks. My city recently got local rules reinstated so that the dilapidated boats can only anchor in one place for a few days before having to move. One of such boats was a dismasted sailboat. But there was a guy living on it and it had an engine. I never saw it move and did complain that he might be emptying his toilet into the intracranial. But he was frequently inspected by the authorities and they checked his black water tank.


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## JohnGalt (9 mo ago)

It's simple money. Those who have homes with a view don't want their view obstructed, they don't want the beach or pier loaded with old dinghies. They have paid for their homes and it isn't right that someone can have the same access that hasn't paid for it. Those homeowners will do what they can to restrict access to people that are not a part of their "club" whether its passing city ordinances, creating home owners parks, or even selling public access so private homes can be placed there. If you have the money to travel from marina to marina and play by their rules you will be fine. If on the other hand you like to anchor out and motor in your days are numbered in some locations and completely gone in others.

I've lived with the changes and fought them as best I can. When the county spends millions to buy ocean front property then refuses to place a boat ramp or even allow boaters to tie up to the public park you know something is up. That something is (having gone to the meetings) that it is homeowners who don't want others to have access. 

Just my $.02 from spending decades in the FL Keys as a resident, liveaboard, sailor, and just general boater.


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## joethecobbler (Apr 10, 2007)

It's cyclical, 
As one area becomes unfriendly another area becomes the New draw.
That's part of the appeal, the ever changing environment.
It ebb's and flows like the tide.


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## joethecobbler (Apr 10, 2007)

LaPoodella said:


> I heard that in Santa Cruz, at least, the harbor has tried to eliminate this type of misuse by requiring the boats to move at regular intervals. But the waitlist for a slip is decades long and you have to pay to stay on the list. I actually think it has got better in the last few years. The boats in Santa Cruz that were dilapidated are gone. On the east coast, there are a lot more marinas and a lot more private ones. They are NOT cheaper than living on land. They have lots of requirements. FL changed their mooring laws and some dilapidated boats started anchoring and staying in the same place for years. Local governments had to petition the state to get local rules to govern mooring fields. The mooring fields weren’t that convenient though because there wasn’t any place to get to land nearby. There are few dinghy docks. My city recently got local rules reinstated so that the dilapidated boats can only anchor in one place for a few days before having to move. One of such boats was a dismasted sailboat. But there was a guy living on it and it had an engine. I never saw it move and did complain that he might be emptying his toilet into the intracranial. But he was frequently inspected by the authorities and they checked his black water tank.


Your information regarding mooring Fields and upland facilities is incorrect.
In accordance with the fwc,state statutes and other regulations.
Mooring Fields must include upland facilities,- dock access, pump out, water,etc.
Which is a major expense and stumbling block to mooring Field development.


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## JohnGalt (9 mo ago)

Once a mooring field is put in they can eliminate the anchorage and regulate who can and can't use it


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## Don L (Aug 8, 2008)

JohnGalt said:


> Once a mooring field is put in they can eliminate the anchorage and regulate who can and can't use it


I am OK with that having spent lots of time on moorings. For the most part the regulations are about maintaining a degree of standards that is still pretty low. Just because I am boat scum doesn't mean I want the boat moored next to me to be floating trash pile that has a screaming dunk battle every night.


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## joethecobbler (Apr 10, 2007)

JohnGalt said:


> Once a mooring field is put in they can eliminate the anchorage and regulate who can and can't use it


Well, that's partially correct.
Using St Augustine as an example.
Initially, when the mooring Fields were emplaced, All anchoring within the city/ county limits wàs eliminated.
That was challenged in Court actions and it was determined to be unenforceable,and limited anchoring within the mooring Fields and an area around them. 
Allowing anchoring outside of the mooring Fields to continue.
The counter,by those who oppose anchoring, wàs to minimize Access to land by those who choose to anchor.
This largely resulted in more Court challenges,and " pushed" the anchoring vessel's North and south of the county's jurisdiction.
Creating a " New" anchorage just outside the city/county line, adjacent to a public launch ramp.
Now,the anchored" live aboards" previously anchored where the mooring Fields are ,are anchored further from the pump out facilities as well as the Marinas services.
Thus, those who choose to anchor are now "docking" their dingies at the launch ramp,in a previously seldom used access and previously quiet neighborhood adjacent to the launch ramp.
Thereby, creating a" New" issue for that area with the usual cast of characters who choose to anchor.
So then, the neighbors got tired of the traffic created by the" New" Anchorage,and began calling the cops to address the issue.
The police responded by confiscating dingies left unattended at the launch.
It's a cluster, it's done nothing to address the alleged sanitary concerns,and has just pushed the issues to another area.
An example of unintended results and poorly thought out government actions.
But it satisfied a few of the outspoken land owners and the Marinas in the mooring Field areas benefit financially from the elimination of most of the anchoring.


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