The Steamship Authority’s rising costs and staffing woes have the boat line already thinking about higher rates and scaled-back schedules next year. 

At the board of governors meeting Tuesday, Steamship staff warned of potential fare hikes in 2025 and approved running the same pared down summer schedule that was implemented this year.

The news comes as the ferry service works to keep ferries running while juggling staffing shortages, construction of a new terminal, improvements in information technology systems and labor negotiations with the licensed deck officer union. 

“We are going to see fare adjustments for next year,” said Mark Rozum, the Steamship’s treasurer and comptroller. “Looking at the cost of labor agreements, the IT investment we’re making and the maintenance expenses I’ve seen coming in the preliminary budget, I don’t see many categories that would not be subject to a fare adjustment next year.” 

Staffing has been the chief concern for many Island residents and board members in recent weeks, with crewing cancellations piling up after the Steamship Authority already made cuts to service. 

In May this year, in addition to reductions on the Nantucket route, the Steamship Authority decided to stop running three daily weekday roundtrip Sankaty freight boat trips in high summer due to the lack of crew. Instead, the boat line brought over the larger Woods Hole ferry onto the Vineyard route to make up for the lost car spaces. 

On Tuesday, the board voted to run the same schedule next year in light of crew shortages, but some members of the board of governors wondered if that was even possible as cancellations due to crew shortages persist. 

“I still have a concern that, given the last few days of running the schedule that is being proposed again, that it’s aspirational and not practical,” said Peter Jeffrey, the Falmouth board member. “We haven’t been able to run this schedule, and I think reliability goes longer with the traveling public than a schedule that seems aspirational.”

Steamship officials Tuesday laid out what they have done to try and attract crew members onto ferries. The boat line has attended 21 different job fairs on the Cape, South Coast and beyond in the past year, and has traveled as far as California and other maritime academies to beef up the ranks.

But the Steamship’s struggles in hiring mirror others around the country and come as fewer students enter the marine engineering and transportation fields. 

The class of 2023 at the Massachusetts Maritime Academy in Buzzards Bay had 187 graduates between the two majors. The class of 2024 has 172 and the class of 2025 has 126. Maine Maritime also showed declining numbers of cadets going into these fields, Steamship Authority chief of operations Mark Higgins said.

The Steamship Authority does pay for training and hires cadets as summer workers, in an attempt to draw more people into the profession, but James Malkin, the Vineyard’s representative on the board, suggested the Steamship Authority look into other ways to be competitive, such as building employee housing.

“Everybody in the aviation industry, in the marine industry, is looking at shortages, is looking at the issues of getting people to work,” Mr. Malkin said. “We clearly are all fishing in the same pond here for people to come to work so I really think anything we can think of to deal with this situation, I for one, would be very supportive.” 

There are also concerns about retaining the current staff. Seven of the current 57 Steamship captains and pilots, the two highest levels of crews, are over the age of 64, leading to concerns about pending retirements.

The Steamship Authority is currently in negotiations with its crew member union and had a closed-door session Tuesday to talk about a contract. Union leaders have said that better pay and better hours could help solve the staffing shortages. 

Christine Todd, the chair of the Dukes County Commission, urged the boat line to do as much as it can to right the ship. 

“I am inundated with concerned voices of our citizenship regarding the ongoing and ever-increasing problems with the reliability of the Steamship transportation,” she said. “I’m often being asked now, ‘what are you doing about it as our appointing authority?’ I am at a loss for words, as I have seen very little movement in a positive direction that I may justify with an improvement.”