The Changing Role Of Today's Harbormaster

Within the last decade municipal harbormasters have found themselves at the center of a complex decision-making puzzle. No longer are they simply in charge of maintaining safe navigation within their harbors; they are now required to manage a wide range of activities in and around the coastal waters of their community. A project to assess the current status of New England harbormasters, to determine whether structured training is necessary, and to quantify training experiences and needs is described. This report provides information on the changing background of harbormasters, discusses the organization of the harbormaster office, describes trends in law enforcement and mooring regulation, provides information on previous training, and identifies the need for more. The facts and figures in this report were obtained from a mail-in survey of all New England harbormasters and a field inspection of ten selected harbors in the same region. Grant no. NA89AA-D-SG-082