Adventures in Government: Key West Cruise Ships Edition

Cruise ship docked in Key West. Photo by Yinan Chen, Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons

What a tangled web we weave when cruise ships want to come in from the sea, and lobby the State of Florida to override the Key West locals to do so.

By decisive, even overwhelming margins, the voters approved ballot measures to immediately slash the number of passengers who can disembark daily as well as ban the biggest ships. But several months later, in an end-around that has incensed locals, the cruise industry is fighting back. Two state lawmakers with broad industry backing are pushing bills to nullify the vote and prohibit Key West from regulating such activity in its own port…

…The November vote limited the total number of cruise-ship tourists allowed to come ashore every day to 1,500 — fewer than half the daily average in February 2020. It also closed the port to ships with more than 1,300 passengers and crew — about half the size of most ships that docked before the pandemic. The final charter change gave docking priority to ships with the best environmental and health records.

Industry officials contend the result ultimately will cripple cruise tourism in Key West and endanger hundreds of local jobs that depend on the big ships. The city’s coffers will take a big hit, they predict. Cruise-related taxes brought in $21 million in 2018.

The new rules will be “the destruction of the port as we know it,” said John E. Wells, another native and chief executive of Caribe Nautical Services. His firm is the agent for every cruise ship that docks in Key West. “We have 287 port calls scheduled for 2022,” ships often making a stop as they loop through the Caribbean. “Only 18 will meet the size criteria.”

The Committee for Safer, Cleaner Ships, the local group fighting the state legislation, scoffs at those claims. Key West will do just fine without the megaships, said treasurer Arlo Haskell, a writer and poet. Citing the industry’s own figures, he pegs cruise revenue at about 7 percent of all tourist spending in Key West in a normal year. Ships will continue to dock, he notes, although only the smaller ones.

“The goal is to make Key West the premier small-ship destination,” Haskell said, while holding onto the overnight and extended-stay tourists who are the backbone of the city’s tourist trade, the ones filling hotels, B&Bs and restaurants.

To Wells, opponents’ arguments carry a whiff of elitism. The smaller ships cater to a moneyed crowd; the big ships bring the cost of a cruise within reach of middle-income and working-class people.

“I call it economic discrimination,” he said. “That’s not what Key West is about.”

He and others say seaport traffic benefits areas far from port communities and should be governed by the state or federal government. They would prefer one set of port regulations “instead of a patchwork of conflicting restrictions in each municipality,” according to a statement by the powerful Cruise Lines International Association.

The initial bills in Tallahassee indeed covered all 15 Florida seaports. They were greeted with vehement protest from legislators loath to see cities in their districts lose control of their ports.

So amendments were tacked on that only prohibited cities from restricting cruise ships in their ports, excluding those ports controlled by a county or port authority. That left only Key West, Panama City, Pensacola and St. Petersburg subject to the proposed prohibitions. Of those four, only Key West is a cruise-ship destination. (The state constitution prohibits bills that target a single municipality, hence the need to create a “class” of city-controlled ports.)

Lawmakers may not be finished trying to punish Key West for its November vote. In a recent tweet, Roach urged his colleagues to oppose giving federal stimulus money to ports that ban cruise ships. “Yep, looking at you city of Key West,” he wrote.

This is a new spin on the very old debate over “home rule” and state vs local government:

In the Florida Keys, elected leaders continue to speak out against two bills that would cancel out a decision by Key West voters to restrict cruise ship traffic to the island.

It’s a matter of protecting “home rule,” they said.

The Monroe County Commission on Wednesday, unanimously and without comment, approved a resolution urging state lawmakers to support home rule for counties and cities and also oppose two bills that commissioners say preempt local government’s authority.

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“We are always very protective of home rule,” said County Mayor Michelle Coldiron in a text Thursday. “The municipalities and county support each other defending home rule.”

* * *

“The Monroe County Commissioners routinely express support for home rule and oppose state legislative efforts that preempt local authority,” the county said in a statement. “In recent years, the legislature has acted to preempt the home rule authority of local governments from legislating on policy areas like vacation rentals, use of single-use plastic bags and tree trimming.”

The resolution states that “preemption by the state legislature weakens the home rule authority of local government and its ability to respond to local challenges and protect local interests.”

The Key West City Commission in February passed a similar resolution against the seaport-related bills, saying it would “deny the will of local voters at the expense of the environment.”

“The Florida legislature’s efforts to limit home rule conflicts with the rights and ability of local government and local voters to protect and improve their own community and the environment,” the city commission’s resolution states.

Commissioner David Rice, of Marathon, said he has no strong feelings on either side of the Key West cruise ship debate, stating he lives an hour away.

“I support the democratic process,” Rice said. “They had an election and I am somewhat appalled that people sitting 600 miles away would override home rule to that extent.”

So, who ya got: Upset locals or lobbied state legislators? Discuss.