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MARINE INDUSTRY DAY PREPARATIONS UNDER WAY! YOUR HELP NEEDED! |
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Your support is needed to help make this year’s Marine Industry Day Events as big a success as last year. We need a towboat for our annual towboat tour. We are looking for volunteers to help organize our annual Line Throwing Contest. We also need to be sure the date and time for the Line Throwing Contest gets out to all our vessels. Don’t forget to come hear the Steam Calliope 44, sponsored by Seamen’s Church, which will be there all three days of the BBQ on the River.. This year, we would also like to invite companies to place a kiosk on site. For more information, contact Sandy Watson at Ingram Barge Company, at 270-441-1623, or e-mail her at Sandra.Watson@ingrambarge.com. |
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ORSANCO FRESH WATER AQUARIUM The charge for the aquarium is $1,000 a day plus expenses, but we have been offered the aquarium for $3000. We are looking for donations to help sponsor the aquarium. For more information, or to help with the sponsorship, contact Mark Mayfield at Tennessee Valley Towing. His Office: 270-554-0154, Cell: 270-559-0110 or e-mail address: mmayfield@tennesseevalleytowing.com. |
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Dear AWO Members, While the Congressional frenzy to legislate fixes to the Deepwater Horizon spill has commanded much of our recent attention, we have also been working on two other critical matters that need timely resolution. Please give me a call if you would like to discuss either of these issues. Buried in the House Coast Guard Authorization Bill is an onerous provision that would do great harm to the tugboat industry and overturn 150 years of case law and operational practice on U.S. waters. The provision would subject tugboats to the monopoly of state pilotage. AWO was successful in getting Massachusetts state pilotage requirements for tugboats operating in Buzzards Bay removed from the Senate Coast Guard bill, but the House bill passed with a similar provision. Congressional staff is working to reconcile the differences between the two bills now with the target date of passage in September. AWO is using the August recess to argue and win support for our position that the final law should not contain any state pilotage requirements that interfere with the Coast Guard’s authority to regulate tugboat licensing and pilotage. AWO continues to press hard on DHS for the release of the draft NPRM on towing vessel inspection. Inexplicably, the Department of Homeland Security continues to sit on the towing vessel inspection proposed regulation, 18 months after its arrival there following the Coast Guard’s completion of the draft NPRM. Using Congressional contacts behind the scenes, AWO is requesting a face-to-face meeting with DHS Secretary Napolitano. We also continue to send her the message that, in the wake of the Deepwater Horizon disaster, DHS should not want to have safety regulations stalled under the yoke of her bureaucracy after Congress, the Coast Guard and the industry have all requested a higher regulatory standard. To see House T&I Committee Chairman Oberstar’s letter to Secretary Napolitano encouraging the publication of the NPRM, click here. Tom __________________________ Thomas A. Allegretti President & CEO The American Waterways Operators 801 North Quincy Street, Suite 200 Arlington, VA 22203 (703) 841-9300, Extension 250 |
