North Carolina tried to use the Internet auction site eBay to sell the pontoon passenger ferry it bought in 2004 for a route across Currituck Sound, but the auction deadline passed Monday with no acceptable bids for the unused vessel.
The State Surplus Property Agency recently listed the ferry on eBay with a minimum acceptable price of $200,000. The project for which it was purchased became an embarrassing disaster for the N.C. Department of Transportation.
DOT officials are not saying what will happen next. Calls to Ferry Division Director Jack Cahoon and DOT spokesman Ernie Seneca were not returned by late Monday.
DOT purchased the custom-made 49-person boat for use on a passenger-only, 10-mile ferry route across the Currituck Sound between the Currituck community and Corolla. It was delivered in August 2004 to the State Shipyard in Manns Harbor but was never put into service.
The project came to a standstill that year when U.S. Army Corps of Engineer officials determined that DOT Ferry Division employees used workboats to “prop wash” a channel in an essential marine habitat at the Corolla end of the route. When news reports about the incident surfaced, Ferry Division Director Jerry Gaskill and other DOT officials said the damage done to the sound was accidental.
However, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the N.C. State Bureau of Investigation, the U.S. Coast Guard Investigative Service, and the Corps of Engineers conducted a lengthy investigation, which led to criminal charges.
The General Assembly appropriated $834,000 in June 2003 for the project, stating that the service was to be in operation on or before May 1, 2004. Dredging was part of the plan when that appropriation was made. According to the project budget submitted by Gaskill to DOT Secretary Lyndo Tippett in January 2003, about half of the funds were for startup costs, including $200,000 to purchase the vessel and $122,400 in dredging expenses.
Plans for the project were initiated soon after the Currituck County Board of Commissioners asked State Sen. Marc Basnight in July 2002 to help establish a ferry service to transport schoolchildren from the Outer Banks to the mainland. But previous stories by CJ showed that a scheme to transport resort workers and tourists was a major factor behind the project. Estimates of the number of schoolchildren who might use the service varied considerably, but eventually dwindled to zero.
The 2002 state budget bill ordered the DOT to perform a feasibility study. Gaskill conducted a study and submitted it to the Assembly in May 2003.
“The proposed ferry service is feasible, assuming the appropriate permits can be obtained,” Gaskill concluded in the study. But he failed to address two previous unsuccessful attempts by Currituck County to obtain a dredging permit for the shallow Corolla location.
State and federal environmental agencies had ruled that the area was a sensitive marine habitat that needed to be protected. At the time of the illegal dredging, neither DOT nor Currituck County had applied for a permit.
Criminal charges
Ferry Division supervisor Bill Moore avoided a trial and pleaded guilty in 2005 to ordering the workers to do the dredging. Three other Ferry Division workers who participated in the dredging pleaded guilty to misdemeanors.
Gaskill pleaded not guilty to several charges and his case went to trial. A jury convicted him of making a material false statement to the Corps of Engineers during an investigation of the dredging. His false statement obstructed federal efforts to identify the dredgers and to begin remediation at the site. Gaskill said in court that he did not knowingly lie.
In March 2007 U.S. District Judge Terrance Boyle sentenced Gaskill and Moore to three years of probation for their roles in the illegal dredging. They also were sentenced to six months of home containment, 50 hours of community service, and a $5,000 fine.
Under the federal sentencing guidelines each was expected to receive up to two years of active prison time. The federal government did not challenge Moore’s sentence, but appealed Boyle’s sentence for Gaskill. Prosecutors thought Boyle was obligated to give Gaskill a harsher penalty.
The execution of Gaskill’s sentence is on hold. The Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond is waiting until the U. S. Supreme Court rules on three cases involving a District Court judge’s authority to deviate from sentencing guidelines.
CJ asked Sen. Basnight’s Communication Director Schorr Johnson if Basnight had any comments about the failed ferry project. “Senator Basnight’s longtime practice, in instances where state action is needed, has been to support the wishes of the local governments he represents. He did so in this case, and he will continue to do so in the future,” he responded.
Don Carrington is executive editor of Carolina Journal.