PORT ANGELES – Steve Rodrigues wants to bring the famous ferry Kalakala, now a beat-up, rusting shadow of its storied past, back to Port Angeles.
There the dilapidated ferry would be restored and serve as a centerpiece for a new development along the city waterfront, Rodrigues says.
But, based on Rodrigues’ track record, it is questionable whether he can find funding to act on his dreams — and the owner of the land he wants to buy says “we are nowhere” on negotiations.
Rodrigues wants to dock the 74-year-old Kalakala — which once shuttled passengers and cars between Port Angeles and Victoria — at a marina he would build east of the Red Lion Hotel. The development would include condos and apartments, retail space and a tourist “welcome center.”
The Kalakala would be a floating restaurant and special-events center.
Rodrigues, a 58-year-old Tacoma-area building contractor and investor, has owned the Kalakala for the last six years.
He said he will he will announce his Port Angeles plans today in a “worldwide press release.”
He also has a splashy Web site, www.thekalakala.com.
Hailed for its unique streamlined superstructure, art deco-styling and luxurious amenities in the 1930s, the Kalakala has been moored for the past five years at a private dock in Tacoma’s Hylebos Waterwater in an acute state of disrepair.
What Rodrigues proposes for Port Angeles is much like a development he had proposed for the Kalakala in Tacoma, which he said in 2006 was “the right community” for the old ferry.
The Tacoma development, as he envisioned it, would include an indoor snow-skiing facility, sky-diving, a hotel and a dolphin aquarium.
His proposals have gotten no interest and no funding despite Rodrigues’ attempts to interest potential investors, Tacoma city officials, Pierce County, the state and the U.S. government.
Met city manager
Rodrigues said bringing the vessel to Port Angeles would have a positive economic impact on Port Angeles as “a world-class project.”
He added:
“It’s about bringing something very special to a community and making a difference.
“That ship will make a difference, not Steve Rodrigues.”
Rodrigues met for 30 minutes earlier this week with Port Angeles City Manager Kent Myers and attended a meeting of the Harbor-Works Development Authority, which plans to direct development of the former Rayonier pulp mill site about two miles east of where Rodrigues would dock the Kalakala.
It wasn’t the first time Rodrigues has made an effort to return the Depression-era, 276-foot-long ferry to Port Angeles.
He made several attempts to interest city leaders and investors after buying the Kalakala for $136,560 in 2003 in a Seattle bankruptcy sale.
Earlier, a group of Port Angeles residents had talked about acquiring the old ferry, which is featured on a mural on the downtown Bank of America building.
“He still has not secured his financing,” Myers said after this week’s meeting with Rodrigues.
Myers called the permit process for Rodrigues’ multi-phased project “pretty extensive.”
He said Rodrigues did not discuss the cost of the project, describing their talk as “very general in nature.”
“We told him once he gets his financing in place and the property is under escrow and secured, to come back and visit with us,” Myers said.
“We would be glad to visit with him some more.”
Shoreline frontage
Rodrigues said Wednesday that he is attempting to negotiate the purchase of 400 feet of shoreline frontage and an acre of uplands with property owners Gerald Austin and Jack Glaubert of Port Angeles that would be directly upland from the proposed marina, he said.
He wants to build condominiums on those uplands east of Chase Street at some time in the future and lease the land to a private developer, he said.
Rodrigues said restoration of the dilapidated Kalakala would cost $11.2 million over three years and a floating-dock marina less than $2 million over two years.
Funds for project?
Asked whether he has the funds to finance the project, he said:
“I have more than enough to know that we are going to fully proceed with the project.”
He would not say how much cash he has on hand.
“We don’t need to tell you that,” he said.
“We have more than enough in resources and capacity at this stage of the game to build the project over the next three years.”
Austin said Rodrigues has been trying to buy the Austin-Glaubert property for a couple of years.
“We are nowhere,” Austin said Wednesday of discussions about purchasing the frontage and uplands.
“He has come up with different ideas that haven’t worked out.
“He is still working on it. He wants us to give him the property, and he will get the money through a grant.”
“He doesn’t have the money.”
Popular attraction
From 1935 to 1967, the Kalakala — “Flying Bird” in the Chinook tribal tongue — ferried cars and people between Seattle and Bremerton and Port Angeles and Victoria.
The vessel was a popular attraction for locals and tourists.
It was voted second only to the Space Needle in popularity among visitors to Seattle during the 1962 Seattle World’s Fair.
After its retirement, it became a cannery in Kodiak, Alaska, before being refloated and returned to Seattle in 1998 by sculptor Peter Bevis.
Its restoration into a tourist attraction was the unfulfilled dream — and financial undoing — of Bevis and his partners.
Rodrigues took the Kalakala to Tacoma in September 2004 after controversial stays in Seattle’s Lake Union and Neah Bay.
Earlier this year, Rodrigues talked about trying to acquire the four forcibly retired 82-year-old Steel Electric-class state ferries that were once fixtures on the Port Townsend-Keystone run.
He said he wanted to operate the Steel Electrics and the Kalakala as either ferries powered by wind and solar technologies — or as restaurants, maritime interpretive centers and state-of-the-art event space.
The Steel Electrics were sold by the state ferry system to a recycling company in Mexico where they are being scrapped.
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Staff writer Paul Gottlieb can be reached at 360-417-3536 or at paul.gottlieb@peninsuladailynews.com
