Washington State Ferries, a division of the Washington State Department of Transportation, is the largest ferry system in the U.S. and carries tens of millions of riders each year. In late February, state Transportation Secretary Roger Millar announced that career mariner Steve Nevey was being named the assistant secretary for WSF.
Nevey, who began in his new position on March 16, succeeded Patty Rubstello, who stepped down from the role after more than 33 years of service with the Washington State DOT.
During the two years before being promoted to his current role, served as WSF’s director of marine operations, and had been instrumental in the development of programs that address ongoing staff shortages in the industry.
In June, Pacific Maritime Managing Editor Mark Nero spoke with Levey about his tenure so far as the head of the ferry service provider. The below Q&A was lightly edited for length and clarity purposes.
Q. Coming into the job as head of Washington State Ferries, were there any specific goals that you had for the organization?
A. I’d already been with Washington State Ferries for about two years as the operations director (before being promoted to the top job), so during the interview process I laid out five things that I would focus on right away and those have kind of changed a little bit now that I’m actually in the seat.
But in the Operations department I’d been embarking on a kind of culture change, and I wanted to see that effort scaled up through the whole organization, to embark on this switch to a values based, people first culture over a kind of ego-based very dry public sector culture.
And Ferries is part of WSDOT and we get a lot of our resources from WSDOT, but it’s very murky because we’re a maritime organization; WSDOT’s focused on highways. One of my major efforts was to try and align those resources better (between WSF and the Washington State Department of Transportation). Then, I wanted to start up a new department (Quality Assurance, Sustainability & Environmental).
We’ve have some big incidents over the past several years (and) I want that department to really make sure that lessons were learned from those big incidents and from small incidents and actually acted upon. I want a team that’s focused on making sure (that they are acted upon).
And (also), I was getting frustrated with a lot of the media coverage because I thought a lot of it was inaccurate. I felt if we could communicated better, some of this stuff could be corrected and we could wrestle the narrative back, so I wanted to come up with a strategic communication plan.
And the last thing was to look at the electrification program and make sure that we are using industry best practices and not just building ships the same way the government builds schools. I wanted to bring my past industry experience in and see are we doing this the best way for the state.
Those were the five goals that I articulated during my interview process, and as I took the seat, I shaped them into three strategic priorities for the whole organization, which are: service excellence, improved communications and empowered people.
Q. What’s the status of WSF’s move toward adding more electric hybrid vessels, and why is adding them important?
A. Currently, we don’t have any hybrid electric vessels. So, the state has this 2025 carbon emission goal—zero carbon emissions by 2050—and Ferries is the biggest state-owned carbon emitter, so there’s a big focus on us being a big part of achieving that statewide goal.
Even before I started here, they had come up with this plan to build 16 new electric ferries, convert six existing ferries and electrify all the terminals so they have charging capabilities. That’s the plan so that we can achieve the zero (emissions) goal by 2050.
Our long range plan calls for all of that work to be done by 2040, which is extremely ambitious considering its 2024 now. The status is, we’ve got one vessel that’s being converted—it’s had two diesel engines removed and then put in batteries. We expect that vessel to be in service or doing sea trials later this year into the early new year and in service early into the new year.
And then we just released our invitation for bid(s) for the first five hybrid electric car ferries. That’s a nationwide bid, so right now we’re waiting to see how many shipyards respond to us from around the country and then we’ll start the prequalification process to make that the shipyards that are interested can actually build the vessels.
We expect to get two new (converted) vessels in 2028 and all five done by 2030. And in the background, we’re working on a new design for what the sixth, seventh, eighth vessels are going to be. In our system, you need different (types of) vessels for different routes and different kinds of operating parameters.
We’re the biggest state-owned polluter in Washington state, so if we don’t embark on this, then the state can’t get to that emissions goal.
Q. Has anything surprised you so far about running WSF?
A. The media scrutiny is surprising, the amount of pressure from outside—I knew that was there, but I didn’t know how much until I actually got into this seat, and then all the spotlights are on you, and everyone wants to talk to you. I was just kind of hoping to fix things from the inside, but learning to be the face of the organization was kind of surprising. I don’t think I was really prepared for that.
Q. What have been the most challenging and rewarding parts of the job so far?
A. The challenge is learning where the levers I have to pull are to get things done. There’s a lot that needs to be done—you have the (state) Legislature, you have the Governor’s office, you have all these different stakeholders. But I feel like I’m getting more comfortable with that.
The most rewarding thing is seeing that I’ve laid out a vision for everybody at WSF, and it’s really rewarding seeing people respond to that vision positively. I’ve always wanted to lead people and I like leading people and seeing people respond to my leadership and the vision that I’ve laid out and be excited about it, it really feels good.
Q. What’s the status of the Fauntleroy Terminal Span Replacement project (which would replace the aging Fauntleroy ferry terminal)?
A. We’re in the early stages of planning. That terminal was built in the 1950s and its vulnerable to seismic damage—like earthquake damage—so we need to rebuild that dock. It’s currently not fit for the operation we need. If you go down there when the schoolkids are loading onto the ferry, there’s no room to have all the schoolkids and all the cars, and everything. So, we’re looking at a range of options to accommodate the traffic, everything we need to do on the dock and reduce queuing on Fauntleroy Way, which is a big problem.
By the end of this year we should have selected a design, and in the 2027-29 biennium we expect to start construction on that dock, once the design has been selected. There’s a lot of community engagement going on right now on the size of the dock, and those are the issues we’re working through right now.
Q. Those were all my questions; anything else you’d like to mention?
A. There’s a kind of pressure to build more diesel boats to get us out of the boat shortage problem we have, instead of waiting for these hybrid electric boats. People think it’s easy to get two of the last diesel boats we built and build two (more) of those and get them on the water next year and then we could build hybrid electric boats.
But we don’t have a design for a diesel boat; we’d have to start like a year-and-a-half (ago) and design a diesel boat. You wouldn’t get diesel boats on the water any quicker (than hybrid electric ones). I see the logic (behind their thinking), but once you’re on the inside and see how a ferry gets designed and built, we don’t have a design that viable right now, and also we’re kind of mandated to build electric boats. We’d have to change the law, which would take time.
So, building diesel boats won’t be any faster. There’s no ferry dealership down the street.