Tulalips to auction old fishing boats

Published 9:00 pm Sunday, July 30, 2006

TULALIP – Several of the Tulalip Tribes’ oldest fishing boats will be auctioned off later this year in an effort to clear out the tribes’ crowded marina.

Other privately owned boats will be moved to homes in and around the reservation. Many that are left will be demolished.

“I want to turn this from a dead boatyard to a living boatyard, for boats that are going to see the water again,” Tulalip Marina Port Master Tony Gobin said.

Few tribal members continue to make their livings as fishermen, compared to the fishing heyday in the 1980s. Dozens of boats that were once out on the water daily have spent recent years in dry storage.

Some boat owners return frequently to make improvements or to take the boats out for pleasure cruises, but others have neglected their rigs.

“We just don’t have much space down here, and we don’t want to build some great big marina, either,” Gobin said. “We want to keep it private, keep it small.”

Several old boats were demolished last summer, when the boat owners said they had no further use for them. Others were scheduled to be moved to private homes this summer, but an unexpected twist delayed the project.

Early this year, the tribes paid $56,000 for a custom-made boat trailer from a company in Massachusetts. When it was delivered to the Tulalip Reservation last week, marina officials discovered that the trailer had been ransacked.

The delivery truck carrying the trailer apparently broke down during the long haul from the East Coast, Gobin said. The truck was robbed while it sat on a roadside, awaiting repair.

“There were some very important parts that only were fabricated for this particular trailer, and they were stolen,” Gobin said.

Until the manufacturer can create new parts, most of the boats in Tulalip Marina’s dry dock will stay put.

In the meantime, several of the tribes’ original fishing boats will be auctioned off. No date has been set for the auction, but Gobin said it most likely will take place this fall. The auction will be open to the general public.

“There are always people looking for hulls,” Gobin said. “As long as there are boats, there’s always going to be someone dreaming about what they can be.”

Reporter Krista J. Kapralos: 425-339-3422 or kkapralos@heraldnet.com.