Parks Tacoma officially took over daily operations of Breakwater Marina on Oct. 1, ending decades of management by the Tacoma Yacht Club and setting transient moorage rules for the roughly 120 boats that have long called the North Waterfront Drive marina home. Boat owners who signed new leases can stay long-term, but anyone without a new agreement is now being charged a transient moorage rate and must leave or formalize a longer stay within two weeks.
The handover marks the culmination of a monthslong process in which Parks Tacoma pursued incorporating Breakwater Marina into its Point Defiance Marina complex, according to The News Tribune. The agency received more than 90 moorage applications from existing Breakwater tenants, and those who signed up can remain on a month-to-month basis under a moorage agreement. Everyone else is subject to transient terms from Oct. 1 through Oct. 14, after which anyone staying longer must sign a formal moorage agreement with the department.
Boathouses Face a Harder Deadline
Breakwater Marina has about 15 boathouses, and unlike boat slips, boathouses are not eligible for transient moorage at all. Owners must either remove their boathouse entirely or sign both a moorage agreement and a boathouse addendum with Parks Tacoma. Anyone without an agreement in place before Oct. 1 is now considered an unauthorized user or trespasser, and the department says it may restrict access for those owners or secure and remove unauthorized boathouses at the owner’s expense.
That hardline stance is colliding with ongoing litigation. Boathouse owner Toni Froehling filed a lawsuit against Parks Tacoma and the Tacoma Yacht Club on Sept. 9, alleging the two parties engaged in secretive behavior that deprived tenants of their boathouses’ value and sought to force removal of the structures so a similar marina could be built without compensating owners. A Pierce County Superior Court judge dismissed the case against Parks Tacoma on Sept. 18 but let the claims against the Tacoma Yacht Club proceed…