Posted on: Monday, July 23, 2001

Governor hails shipping service

Advertiser Staff

Santa Maria Shipping, a new company planning to start a container ship service between California and Barbers Point Harbor on O'ahu in 2003, won high marks from Gov. Ben Cayetano at a news conference today.

Cayetano said the shipping service will boost efforts to make Kapolei a "second city" on O'ahu. He also said that the company will use vessels built by American workers and manned by American seamen.

Santa Maria, based in Santa Rosa, Calif., and headed by Stas Margaronis, signed a contract Friday with a shipyard in Mobile, Ala., to build two container ships for the weekly service between California and Hawai'i.

Margaronis says his service will save Hawai'i shippers as much as $20,000 a year in freight rates for a customer shipping one weekly westbound, 40-foot container. Santa Maria will compete with Matson Navigation Co. and CSX Corp., the leading shipping companies in Hawai'i.