US SAILING Government Relations
March 2008 Update:
Recent Government Relations Activities for Sailors
1. The US Coast Guard (USCG) and National Boating Safety Advisory Council (NBSAC), chaired by a US SAILING Vice President, signed the first ever-strategic plan with 38 organizational signatories. The mission: “Ensure the public has a safe, secure, and enjoyable recreational boating experience by implementing programs that minimize the loss of life, personal injury and property damage while cooperating with environmental and national security efforts.” The main goals of the plan are to reduce boating casualties and injuries. US SAILING was among 8 organizations that assisted the USCG in creating this plan and the only organization that had three representatives on that panel.
2. US SAILING has been asked to participate in a working group empanelled by the National Safe Boating Council (NSBC) aimed at finding ways to encourage voluntary PFD wear by recreational boaters. This NSBC initiative, funded by the US Coast Guard’s Office of Boating Safety, is another activity in support of the newly signed Strategic Plan. Sailors continue to be the only category of boaters to voluntarily, consistently demonstrate increased PFD wear rates.
3. US SAILING is monitoring and supporting the reinstatement of Federal legislation to exempt recreational boaters from being required to pay for a state permit for normal operational discharges overboard. Efforts to educate Congress on this issue have heightened awareness of the need to extend this exemption by the September 2008 deadline.
4. US SAILING has successfully convinced the US Coast Guard that expensive tracking devices should not be required on all recreational boats. A plan to incorporate such devices was shelved by the USCG in favor of finding less expensive ways to track recreational vessels if required.
5. US SAILING helped to convince the US Coast Guard that a requirement for special marine identification (ID) badges for people on recreational boats was too expensive, would be difficult to enforce and same security purpose could be achieved through carriage of an ID currently accepted like a driver’s license.