New town harbormaster Bob O’Shea has revealed the seamy underside of Harvard’s town dock. The dock currently lies upside down beside Bare Hill Pond, where O’Shea and Jim Lee of the Parks and Recreation Commission are repairing its floats and generally making it pond-worthy for the coming summer season.
O’Shea has a longtime interest in boating, having canoed all his life. He first owned a motorboat while living on Cape Cod. In recent years, he has taken the lead in organizing Harvard’s annual regatta in mid-July. On one memorable occasion, O’Shea took the helm as the “Skipper” from the ’60s TV comedy Gilligan’s Island, with his family suitably costumed in supporting roles.
As Harvard’s harbormaster, O’Shea has a duty under state law to authorize “the mooring on a temporary basis of floats or rafts held by anchors or bottom moorings” within the town’s jurisdiction. As O’Shea explains it, his jurisdiction covers the physical layout of the town moorings, as well as any float or mooring that comes within the public way.
Massachusetts requires a town with a public mooring or dock to have a harbormaster. Harvard has town moorings for 16 to 18 motorboats and sailboats at Bare Hill Pond. Permits for those moorings are issued by the Parks and Recreation Department, based on a lottery among those who have submitted applications at Town Hall.
In past years, O’Shea often assisted Eric Peterson, who was the town’s previous harbormaster. Officially, the position has been vacant for approximately a year since Peterson stepped down. O’Shea had been filling in on an unofficial basis.
