4 FOGHORN Get to Your Region Meeting This Fall I f you have never been to a PVA Region Meeting, this is the year to go. Your region meeting, with the people who run your U.S. Coast Guard district, and the oper- ators who work the same port, is one of the best opportuni- ties for learning and engagement that the PVA offers. I have sat in the big room at the convention, and I have sat in the smaller rooms at region meetings. They are not the same conversation. At the convention you get policy from thirty thousand feet. At a region meeting you get the Coast Guard officer who signs your certificate of inspec- tion (COI), sitting across the table, answering the question you actually have about your port. Just look at what was put together for the South- east Region Meeting on Sept. 23, in Fort Lauder- dale, Fla.: • Navita™ and the credentialing backlog that affects all our operators • The Pitted Plate Assessment Tool and what it means for your next drydock • A roundtable on hospitality management, where you compare notes with people running boats just like yours • Repowering options and what Diesel Emissions Reduction Act (DERA) funding might do for the bill and your next repower • Illegal charter enforcement, straight from Sector Miami Investigations • Force Design 2028 update from the district commander Presentations like last the one are where I want you to show up ready to talk, not just listen. Force Design 2028 is real, it is moving, and it is reorganiz- ing the Coast Guard around border security, counter-nar- cotics, and military read- iness. Fifteen thousand new positions including a new secretary of the Coast Guard. Read the executive report yourself, word by word. “Marine safety” is not in it. “Vessel inspection’ is not in it. “Passenger vessel” is not in it. “Marine inspector” is not in it. “Prevention Pol- icy” is not in it. Neither is “CG-5P.” That is not an accident of editing. That is what gets left out when an organization decides what to lead with. The numbers on the ground back it up. The Coast Guard had 799 marine in- spectors in 2023. It had 768 in 2024. The credentialing backlog sits above 19,000 applications, with processing running close to eight months. Vice Commandant Allan testified in March that 16,000 applications were frozen and growing by roughly 300 a day. Your deckhand wait- ing on his or her license is not an abstraction. Navita™ is supposed to fix this, but a phased rollout is not relief today, ANDREW SARGIS // PRESIDENT AT THE HELM LETTER FROM THE PRESIDENT Continued on page 68 At a region meeting you get the Coast Guard officer who signs your certificate of inspection (COI), sitting across the table, answering the question you actually have about your port.
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