Private Ownership of Ross Island Creates a Safe Harbor for Transient Boaters

In the scorching late July sun, the eight-man crew’s cannonballs skim the top of the bottle-green Willamette River like athlete’s foot. A stand-up paddleboarder glides slowly over glassy water.

And on the heavily forested southern tip of Ross Island, a motley convoy of a dozen and a half abandoned boats is utterly motionless.

They are cabin cruisers, dismasted yachts, and smaller vessels that once hauled skiers or carried sport fishermen. Most of them are temporary housing. Others look like garbage barges, with piles of furniture, clothes, bicycles and trash flooding the water.

Eric Pedersen, who grew up in southeastern Portland, took reporters out on the river last week in a 24-foot Alumaweld boat to show the buildup of unlicensed and illegally moored vessels.

“There is no place to pick up trash here, no place to pump out wastewater,” Pedersen says of the boat. “If I pull the sewage out of my city system, how will it work?”

Those who live, work, or play in the local river agree that there is a crisis in Oregon’s waters. The number of abandoned and derelict boats moored in rivers and estuaries across the state continues to grow. Ships often sink in navigable waters, endangering other boats and threatening to leak fuel and other toxic substances into their drinks. State officials say there are at least 175 people in the metropolitan area, more than a decade ago, and not now.

The epicenter of junk boating is Ross Island, a teardrop-shaped plateau on the Willamette River just upstream from the bridge that gives it its name. Officials say the cove at the southern end of the island is called Toe Island Cove and is home to Portland’s largest concentration of occupied and derelict vessels.

“The last time we were out there, there were an incredible number of boats out there,” says Travis Williams, the Willamette Riverkeeper.

There are many causes. The lack of land-based housing has led people to consider waterside alternatives. Aging fiberglass boats cannot be recycled and are expensive to dispose of. Lack of public funds for crackdown and disposal of derelict boats.

But Ross Island has another problem. Unlike virtually all of the Willamette River (and other navigable Oregon rivers), the river bed, which is populated by abandoned and derelict boats, is privately owned.

The Multnomah County Sheriff’s River Patrol can use funds provided by the Oregon Maritime Commission to tag and tow vessels illegally moored in state waters. But its jurisdiction does not extend to private property, and its secrets are revealed.

“Boaters have learned over the years where they can and cannot be removed or forced away,” says Sgt. Steve Dangler leads the River Patrol. “They know that if they’re too close to the coast of Ross Island, Homeland regulations don’t apply.”

From 1975 until this year, most of the river bed on the island belonged to Ross Island Sand & Gravel, a subsidiary of RB Pamplin Corp. on neighboring Hardtac Island. Mining ceased in 2001, and the company is now under state orders to backfill the holes and restore habitat on both islands, a process he expects to complete by 2035.

Robert Pamplin Jr., President and CEO of RB Pamplin Corp. portland tribune and 23 other Oregon newspapers.

document WW Officials from the Department of Homeland, the Multnomah County Sheriff’s Office, and the Oregon Maritime Commission met repeatedly with Ross Island officials on the issue of the abandoned and derelict vessel, according to public records requests. indicates that

River Patrol danglers spend most of their days on the water, keeping an eye out for swimmers and boaters in distress or misbehaving. He’s also trying to enforce a state law that says boats can only be moored in one place for no more than 30 days, after which they must be moved at least five miles away.

Dangler said one day he tagged seven abandoned or derelict boats on Tow Island, a city-owned piece of land on the west side of Ross Island. Those boats can be towed and can be scrapped if no one claims it. But the highest concentration of such boats in the metropolitan area, just a few meters away, is outside his jurisdiction.

“We enforce boat rules and regulations and laws, but we cannot enforce trespassing around Ross Island,” says Dangler. “So the loophole exists.”

Pamplin spokesman Mark Garber says privatization of the river bed around Ross Island predates statehood, but the company is cooperating with official attempts to deal with unwanted boats. Garber says such boats started showing up around 2009.

Company officials regularly provide photos of sheriff’s offices and information about illegally moored boats. I have given the sheriff written permission to remove the boat. We actively participate in task forces aimed at resolving issues. “Ross Island has worked early and often to improve the devastation it has brought to its property and river,” Garber says.

But Mr Garber said the Multnomah County District Attorney said criminal trespassing cases were unlikely to hold up in court. It says it will require unmanageable inventory and storage with no prospect of replenishment.

Under the advice of lawyers, the company generally does not intervene or tow the boat itself.

“Ross Island Sand & Gravel said RISG had advised them not to be towed as RISG would own and be responsible for the boat and all of its contents,” October 18, 2018. I read a note from Secretary of Homeland Vicki Walker at the meeting today.

In 2020, RISG received permission from the Marine Commission to remove two vessels that burned at Toe Island Cove. It cost the company $16,000 to remove them.

“Ross Island could not get the dime back from the shipowner,” Garber says.

The chat continues. In fact, the situation is further complicated by Robert Pamplin Jr.’s unusual decision.

As WW As previously reported, Pamplin transferred its ownership of Ross Island and Hardtuck Island and their submerged land earlier this year for $10.8 million to RB Pamplin’s pension fund, of which Pamplin is the sole trustee. transferred at an appraised value of (Pensions experts were critical of Pamplin’s sale or transfer of about $50 million worth of RB Pamplin’s real estate to the company’s pension fund.)

As a result of the sale, the dilapidated ship parking lot adjacent to Ross Island is now owned by 2,400 Pamplin pensioners. (Gerber says Ross Island’s sand and gravel rents the island from the pension fund.)

Willamette Riverkeeper Williams, who has worked for decades to restore Ross Island to public lands, says there is a financial conspiracy going on amidst the degradation of the delicate habitat.

“When you look at the area where the boats congregate, you won’t believe how much junk has gathered on Ross Island,” he says. “The whole thing makes no sense.”

The problem of abandoned and derelict boats is a growing threat to the nautical and marine environment here and across the country.

Ron Schmidt, president of the Oregon Waterfront Organization, which represents marinas and other waterfront businesses, pressured the state legislature to take the issue seriously.

“It’s definitely gotten worse,” says Schmidt. “In addition to the homeless problem, we have a generation of fiberglass boats that have reached the end of their lives. And we sell these boats cheaply.”

Older fiberglass boats are available cheaply or for free, like the ancient RVs whose owners were the last resort to avoid disposal costs.

Over the past two years, the Marine Commission has paid for the removal of 44 boats. 38 of them were in Multnomah County. However, the agency’s removal budget is currently limited to $150,000. Three of her bills that would increase available funds for more removals were defeated in Congress in 2021.

But State Senator Kathleen Taylor (D., southeast Portland), whose constituency borders the Willamette River near Ross Island, contested a $1 million interim budget to remove more ships.

That’s a starting point, but not enough to tackle failed boats in the metropolitan area, and even more untold in rivers and estuaries around the state. received $2.7 million from lawmakers for

On Aug. 9, DSL’s Walker will release the governor’s work plan for three members of the State Lands Commission. How Kate Brown, State Treasury Secretary Tobias Reed and Secretary of State Shemir Fagan will invest her $40 million in asking lawmakers to get serious about this problem over the next three years for her agency explain.

“Abandoned and derelict vessels seriously threaten the health and safety of Oregon’s waterways,” said Walker’s memo to the Land Commission. “Threats include water pollution, habitat degradation, damage to public and private property, and impacts on recreational and commercial use and enjoyment of waterways.”

In 2011, Kelly Holtz moved into a row of houseboats near Oaks Park, just upstream on Ross Island. She says she was drawn to Willamette’s ever-changing beauty and the wildlife that used Ross Island as a refuge.

Looking down the river, Holtz sees a lot of illegally moored boats, no garbage removal or even portable toilets. Nearby Willamette A supply ship has popped out of his park’s dock, making it an unauthorized community.

“There are a lot more people here than when I moved in,” says Holtz.

Bob Salinger, Conservation Director of the Audubon Society of Portland, worked with Riverkeeper Williams and Urban Greenspace Institute’s Mike Houck for more than 20 years to persuade Pamplin to turn Ross Island into public land. I’ve been

Pamplin donated 45 acres of the island to the City of Portland in 2007, but negotiations have since broken down, and the island’s ownership by a pension fund only further complicates it.

“Dr. Pamplin is very proud of the island,” Salinger says. “It would be sad if he didn’t move this to a solution.”

Eric Pedersen shares Salinger’s hope that the waters around Ross Island will be restored. He enjoyed swimming and water skiing most summer days in his teenage years 30 years ago, but now he never swims near the island.

When Pedersen took his boat to Willamette Park’s boat ramp on July 29, he saw the crew of a dilapidated sailboat moving away from the dock. water. “