Ferry commuters will be going hungry

Published 9:00 pm Tuesday, December 30, 2003

Don’t expect to ring in the New Year with a bowl of Ivar’s clam chowder on a Washington State Ferry.

The company that serves food on the state’s ferries expects to end service at midnight tonight, despite a two-week extension offered by the state ferry system Tuesday.

Washington State Ferries on Tuesday sent a proposal to Sodexho USA, the food vendor that decided in February to end its contract with the ferry system.

Under the proposal, Sodexho could have continued food service for two weeks under the current contract while negotiations for a new, one-year deal were hashed out.

"Let’s keep the galleys open, keep people working, sit down and have further discussions," said Patricia Patterson, spokeswoman for Washington State Ferries.

But a spokeswoman for Sodexho — which made an offer on a one-year deal to the ferry system last week — said "we are not optimistic."

"Unfortunately, the ferries have rejected this offer," Sodexho USA spokeswoman Leslie Aun said. "We will, of course, take a close look at their counter-proposal, but we really don’t think it’s going to work out. We feel like we gave them our best offer."

Aun said the company wasn’t expecting a counter-proposal.

"We were getting ready to gear down and close operations (today)," she said.

A closure would be the first major shutdown of food service since the galleys opened in 1967.

Patterson said the two-week deal would give the ferry system and Sodexho time to work out a new contract that would make better business sense.

Included in the new deal would be terminating food service on all but three routes, year-round. The three routes that would keep traditional food service would be Edmonds-Kingston, Seattle-Bainbridge Island and Seattle-Bremerton.

The Mukilteo-Clinton route is one that would lose food service, Patterson said, because the trip is a short one.

"People don’t have time to avail themselves of a full-service galley," she said.

The ferries going to the San Juan Islands and Sidney, B.C., would have food service only during the peak season.

Sodexho told Washington State Ferries it wanted to terminate its contract in February, starting a six-month clock that would have expired some time in October.

The ferry system and Sodexho worked out a deal to extend service until the end of the year while the state looked for a new food vendor, with the state ferries taking a smaller fee than in the past.

But the ferry system found no takers on a request for proposals from food vendors, leaving the galleys under threat of closure today.

Patterson said the ferries are looking at higher costs for running food services in the coming year because it is responsible for maintenance and equipment in the galleys.

Reporter Victor Balta: 425-339-3455 or vbalta@heraldnet.com.