another example of govt out of control...thank you for the info....

So if I buy a boat and catch a fish while on my boat I need to pay a port fee? If I get a suntan on my boat I need to pay a port fee for the photons?

Government always has to have its hand in every pocket.

Spacex is a private company, seems they would do what all private companies do when their taxes / fees are raised, pass it on to the customer - in this case NASA, for resupply to ISS, which will cause NASA to up the fees for pad 41, which will cause Spacex to up the fees for delivery.... Im curious what, if any, the "fees were for the returning shuttle boosters, as well as the sections of Saturn rockets, they went through the port to the turning basin.

I can see their point, using the port should incur the same fee as any other user of it, but how large the cargo is shouldn't make much of a difference to the port. Ports do operate as an on-going enterprise, and it certainly takes revenue to operate an enterprise. The obvious thing is though that they shouldn't be treated unlike any other customer and pay the same fees and rate. A surcharge for the security requirements would certainly be warranted.

It's not international trade though, which a 'wharfage fee' would typically mean.

Our Dear Leader, The One, Barack Hussein Obama (mmm, mmm, mmm...) has said that the booster issue is not SpaceX's. Remember the words of our Supreme Leader: "If you’ve got a business — you didn’t build that. Somebody else made that happen."

The Port Authority just needs to find that "somebody else" and present them with the bill.

I heard the egyptians upped the charge on large boats going thu the suez canal to $270,000 to make more money for egypt. Governments have no idea of commerce.

Of course it is a fleece job. Fivedollargold is surprised that Musk didn't negotiate a long-term deal with the Port Authority when he did so with NASA for use of the Cape. Oversight.

On a related issue, has anyone heard of plans to take SpaceX public?

Given the fact that Elon Musk is the Grand Mufti of crony capitalism, there is some ironically poetic justice to be found in this. :)

Charging a higher fee for the additional security needs is probably merited. Knowing what I do about rocket boosters, the environmental impact is also definitely higher than is typical for most cargo. However, the booster is far from the heaviest item to come into Port Canaveral. There is some price gouging here, above and beyond what would be a reasonable surcharge for additional impact on Port Canaveral, but not as much as most think.

Note: I pay a small tax (about $100 of my $3000 per year property tax) to the Port Canaveral Taxing Authority. I don't want additional impact fees that should be charged to port users to be passed on to me.