SIGHTINGS the maritime motion of ocean
continued on outside column of next sightings page Page 36 • Latitude 38 • February, 2024
In what has the potential to be a landmark case, a federal judge ruled late last year that boaters do not have a constitutional right to anchor on Richardson Bay, and declared that local agencies have the authority to create and enforce laws governing vessels anchored in their waters. "To the extent [an anchor-out plaintiff] is alleging a stand-alone constitutional entitlement to anchor where he chooses, the United States' constitution does not confer a blanket right to anchor in Richardson's Bay," federal judge William Orrick wrote in a December 2023 ruling, dismissing the claims of plaintiff Robert Roark, owner of the 60-ft motorsailer Kittiwake, who accused the Richardson Bay Regional Agency
PHOTOS COURTESY of OCEAN MACEDO
Ocean Romeo Macedo didn't dream of working in the marine trades as a young man. Instead, he wanted to become a professional surfer — and he was well on his way. Growing up in Lahaina, Maui, Ocean already had multiple sponsors by the time he was in sixth grade, and was surfing in "quite possibly the most competitive age bracket to ever grace the contest scene, Hawaii's under 12 division," Freesurf magazine wrote about 10 years ago. "It goes without saying that Hawaii has no shortage of youthful endowment, but this talented up-and-comer is a step above the rest." But when the pandemic hit, the global surfing contest circuit shut down. Macedo — who is now 21 years old — was able to dig into his hobbies, and his community on Lahaina, to find other interests. That led him to Spaulding Marine Center's Boatworks 101 Apprenticeship program. "I didn't know what to expect, but it was the best possible introduction to the marine industry," Ocean said of Spaulding's program. "We did a lot of fiberglass, painting, woodworking, machine-shop stuff and engines. Everything was amazing." After completing the Boatworks 101 program, Macedo has Ocean Macedo navigates a serious wave. been working as a diesel mechanic apprentice at Helmut's Marine Services in San Rafael since June of last year, and hopes to open his own all-around marine-service shop in Lahaina some day. "My dream was always to be a pro surfer," Macedo told Latitude in an interview in late 2023. "In my teens, I was traveling the world a lot and going to contests. With COVID the contests slowed down, so I was doing different jobs around Maui. I'd always been interested in working on trucks, specifically Toyotas. I'd buy them, fix them up and sell them." (One writer joked that Maui was "the world's largest Toyota Tacoma dealership.) Macedo gravitated toward boats through an acquaintance. "A neighbor of mine in Lahaina has a boat-charter company and noticed that I was into engines. He offered me a job. I worked on logistics and got to do a little work with their mechanics. It got to a point where I was interested in the trade and wanted to learn more." Another of Macedo's neighbors in Lahaina has a house in Sausalito and told Ocean about the Boatworks program at Spaulding. What was it like moving from tropical Maui to the cold, foggy Bay? "When I was younger, I'd go to SoCal all the time for surf contests. But I'd never been to San Francisco. For me, the transition was very interesting. I grew up in a pretty small town where I knew most of the people … the hardest things to adjust to here were the cold weather and figuring out how to put myself out there. I didn't really have much of a basis to go off as to what the Spaulding program would be." Now in its third year, Spaulding Marine Center's Boatworks 101 offers 12-month paid apprenticeships in the marine-service industry to people 18 and older. The course is part of a state and nationally registered program to train a diverse workforce in a "high-need industry in the San Francisco Bay Area and beyond," Spaulding said. "It felt different than school," Ocean said of the program. "It was more one-on-one (there were six of us in the class) and kind of perfect — the right amount of people teaching one thing about one subject at one time." Spaulding's Boatworks 101 spans a year, three months of which is dedicated to working in several different Bay Area shops. "I started working at Helmut's and after a month, Spaulding asked if I wanted to switch out
judge says "no right" to