I’ve preferred to stay away from commenting on new articles but sometimes even the silent must speak.  Take an article that posted yesterday on MSNBC.com from the Associated Press.  The title tells you all you need to know about the writer’s bias, Economy has boat owners abandoning ship.  Let me show you a few of the‚ quotes that prompted this discussion:

“In recent months, an increasing number of powerboat and sailboat owners have been failing to pay their slip fees…”

“People get financially upside-down and ditch their boats…”

OK, I’m not arguing that there isn’t validity to these statements.  Certainly the whole article does a very good job of highlighting the costs of holding boats when you’re out of money.  What bothers me is that they paint a picture of doom and gloom for the marina industry.  Sure, second and third tier marinas are having a difficult time, but the article makes it sound like there are all these boats that are getting abandoned at all these marinas, which is just not true.  I know because I’ve visited too many marinas; the marina with abandoned and sunk boats is definitely the exception to the rule.

Another problem is that the writer spends most of the article talking about commercial boats.  I agree that the number of such vessels that have been abandoned is alarming and many simply let them sink rather than storing them on land.  For over 15 years, I’ve been driving over this one bridge and watching a tugboat not far outside Baltimore’s Inner Harbor just decay with no one bothering to take it away.  That’s shameful.  What bothers me is that the article is mostly about commercial boats and pleasure boaters are lumped in there.  How about mentioning that 99 percent of the marinas out there do not have sunken boats in them?  How about mentioning what happens after the slip payments go delinquent and the boat is chained to the dock?  After some paperwork, the boat is moved to inland dry storage and auctioned off.  Yes, I’ve been on the yard of the boat repossession company (a marina, of course) and business is booming.

Lastly, how about mentioning what most boaters do before and during their upside down financial period?  They don’t just ditch their boats, they move it onto dry land, sometimes on their own property.  The minority of boats get abandoned and auctioned.