After reaching 1,000 petition signatures we delivered the petition to Rep. Pat Harkins, Sen. Dan Laughlin, and the Governor’s local representative, Mike Ferritto, asking them to call for a public forum on Niagara. We also shared the petition and request for a public forum with PHMCThe Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission (PHMC) is the state agency that stewards the U.S. Brig Niagara and Erie Maritime Museum. The PHMC is responsible for the collect... Executive Director, Andrea LoweryAndrea Lowery, serves as Executive Director and Chief of the Division of Architecture and Preservation for PHMC.. But we’re nowhere near done! As the petition grows we will continue updating legislators and PHMC with the growing numbers of concerned citizens. 

Keep sharing, signing, and contacting legislators directly with your concerns!

We’ve already seen a strong impact with our demands for accountability and transparency, so we need to keep up the good work.

• Dec 16: We broke the story on Niagara with a petition and news coverage.
• Dec 18: PHMC had to acknowledge their changes publicly with a damage-control press release on Monday.
• Jan 4 & 5: At Erie Maritime Museum’s volunteer “information sessions” PHMC claims that staff have been trained to do basic daily safety checks on the vessel. Volunteers demand to know what PHMC will do if they find something wrong during those checks or if winter weather comes. (Specifically winterizing the engines, repairing the cover if it’s damaged, securing the ship prior to bad weather, ice in the water…)
• Winter weather arrives; PHMC is unprepared, and they attempt no maintenance until we break the news:
  • Pre-Jan 9: PHMC did no winter preparations of any sort, despite being given a list from the chief mate in December of what the ship needed for winterizing. They did no preventative storm preparations in spite of volunteer concerns expressed at the Jan 4 & 5 meeting.
  • Jan 9: First tear in the cover occurs. It grows Jan 10. Volunteers share images with the press and get news coverage.
  • Jan 12: After news coverage PHMC asks volunteers to come and assist with securing the ship before the next round of storms.
  • Jan 13: A large amount of the cover is shredded and lying in the water.
  • Jan 16: Ice is visible in the area where the plastic has been lying over the bubbler since Jan 13. (bubbler = ice prevention device)
  • Jan 16: PHMC sends a volunteer update on upcoming trainings with no mention of how the ship fared in the high water, storms, and freezing weather.
  • Jan 17 AM: Petition Update sent with the image of Niagara with plastic in the water and ice forming.
  • Jan 18: PHMC sends out a press release for damage control again, claiming they are removing the plastic, will be installing a vinyl tarp, engines have finally been winterized and everything is totally under control.
  • Jan 19 8:30am: We submit a Right To Know request to PHMC requesting the security footage on Niagara for the past two days, and include the fact that I want to determine whether the 100+ square feet of plastic lying in the water was actually hauled out or just cut away and allowed to remain at the bottom of the slip.
  • Jan 19 10am: A volunteer email is sent saying they “removed the remainder of the cover off the ship and out of the water, with the help of our friends at Lakeshore Towing.” They mentioned they will be bringing in staff from around PHMC to install a heavy gauge cover, and have worked with “several vendors to assist with winterizing the ship’s engine systems and have reworked shore power to bring the bubblers back online.”
  • Last night’s news coverage of ongoing volunteer concerns (Jan 25)

They went DAYS allowing the ice to form and letting the plastic lay in the water. They only took action when we demonstrated that they would be held publicly accountable. People are watching, people are calling them out for their lack of maintenance, and for their lack of communication.

We’re going to take a slightly different tack moving forward. Instead of feeding PHMC all the things we want them to do, we’re going to give them the opportunity to survive or fail on their own and then demand transparency about what they did. They believe they can do this responsibly, they can show us. And if not, we will be there to call them out on it.

They say they are putting this new vinyl cover on next week. In the Jan 18 news coverage PHMC claimed this vinyl cover will protect Niagara for years to come. But in their most recent volunteer email they refer to this as part of an “emergency response plan.” Unlike in past petition updates we’re not going to state in advance all the specific concerns we have as people with experience with the ship. Let’s see how PHMC does on their own. There will be plenty of people watching this installation process… If they do well and communicate it well? Excellent. If not, we will be there to demand transparency and hold them publicly accountable.  

In addition, we have submitted several Right to Know requestsA Right to Know (RTK) request is a request for information from a state or local government body in Pennsylvania. You are allowed to request any kind of information, and aside from... for details on various aspects of PHMC’s past and present decision-making on Niagara. PHMC has requested 30-day extensions on the first two (for complexity, legal review, and the anticipated need for redactions). This morning I received a denial for security footage of the publicly visible area around Niagara, from 8am – 5pm during the two days of cover clean up. These are spaces anyone walking down the sidewalk can see easily. We are waiting for responses on other inquiries. 

PHMC makes a lot of promises (they want the ship to sail, they have a plan…). We intend to see whether their actions and words are consistent. What we find will be shared. And if they redact or deny our requests, claiming privileged or sensitive information, we will share that too.

Stay tuned.

Keep sharing the petition.

Keep up direct contact with PHMC and with legislators.

Make sure they know, we are not giving up the ship.

Kathleen Zawrotniak

Petition creator, fellow Niagara supporter