Posted:
June 9, 2011
By Tom Bethel
National President
Already the nation's leading union of licensed merchant mariners, American Maritime Officers reached yet another pinnacle on June 7 with the grand opening of our union's first-ever fully functional national headquarters building.
Seagoing AMO members and their families joined dignitaries from government, labor and industry in marking this significant occasion during a daylong celebration at the site at 601 South Federal Highway in Dania Beach, Florida. The building is across the street from the small, cramped two-story office that had housed the AMO administration and support staff for some 20 years and from the expanding AMO Plans complex that includes the AMO Safety and Education Plan's STAR Center - which provides all AMO members with the advanced training they need to remain the best at what they do at sea each day.
After the invocation from the Rev. Thomas O'Dwyer of the Church of the Little Flower in Hollywood, participants heard from several speakers: Florida Republican Rep. Allen West, who presented American Maritime Officers with a United States flag that had flown over the Capitol in Washington; Dania Beach City Commissioner Walter Duke; Seafarers International Union President Michael Sacco, president of the AFL-CIO Maritime Trades Department; Maritime Administrator David Matsuda; RADM Mark H. Buzby, commander of the U.S. Navy's Military Sealift Command; RADM William D. Baumgartner, U.S. Coast Guard 7th District, Miami; and Anthony Naccarato, co-chair of AMO Plans and president of the Washington-based American Maritime Officers Service.
These speakers struck separate yet common themes: the wartime roles of the privately owned and operated U.S. merchant fleet and civilian American merchant mariners; the contributions made to the Dania Beach and South Florida communities by AMO; our union's remarkable rise and sustained security over 62 often turbulent years; our union's leadership on national maritime policy in the Executive and Legislative Branches of the federal government; the impact of regulation on the ability of merchant mariners to do their jobs and advance in their careers.
Speaking on behalf of the AMO national executive board, I opened the program by dedicating the beautiful structure to all deep-sea, Great Lakes and inland waters AMO members, and by explaining that the new building is a far more fitting symbol of the unmatched quality AMO members represent.
I also pointed out that seagoing AMO members - not AMO officials, representatives or employees - had performed the symbolic groundbreaking to begin the project, and that seagoing AMO members had approved construction of the building in a 90-day union-wide secret ballot policy referendum in 2009. This referendum was not required under the AMO National Constitution, but I wanted AMO members to make the call - they had done so much to secure our union's superior standing, and I wanted their collective voice heard on this important initiative.
In addition, I reaffirmed my administration's commitment to continued sound financial management and to ever-increasing operating efficiency, a cause made easier in several ways by the new building. The structure and the land are owned outright by AMO, so the operating expenses will be minimal. Having all administrative departments under one roof will result in additional substantial savings (lower utility bills, for example), and our union will no longer have to rent space from AMO Plans for monthly AMO membership meetings and other union functions.
The day before the grand opening, I chaired the inaugural regularly scheduled AMO headquarters monthly membership meeting in the new space. During the meeting, I was honored to welcome Florida Democratic Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, who offered congratulations and continued support to AMO.
Upon adjournment, I was privileged to unveil a plaque to be mounted in the lobby of the new building. "Dedicated with admiration, respect and gratitude to the men and women of American Maritime Officers, the nation's largest union of merchant marine officers," the plaque reads. "We pledge ourselves to a level of service equal to the standards of excellence set each day by the finest licensed seagoing professionals in the world."
To me, the plaque says it all.
AMO Headquarters reflects commitment to service
By Tom Bethel
National President
Already the nation's leading union of licensed merchant mariners, American Maritime Officers reached yet another pinnacle on June 7 with the grand opening of our union's first-ever fully functional national headquarters building.
Seagoing AMO members and their families joined dignitaries from government, labor and industry in marking this significant occasion during a daylong celebration at the site at 601 South Federal Highway in Dania Beach, Florida. The building is across the street from the small, cramped two-story office that had housed the AMO administration and support staff for some 20 years and from the expanding AMO Plans complex that includes the AMO Safety and Education Plan's STAR Center - which provides all AMO members with the advanced training they need to remain the best at what they do at sea each day.
After the invocation from the Rev. Thomas O'Dwyer of the Church of the Little Flower in Hollywood, participants heard from several speakers: Florida Republican Rep. Allen West, who presented American Maritime Officers with a United States flag that had flown over the Capitol in Washington; Dania Beach City Commissioner Walter Duke; Seafarers International Union President Michael Sacco, president of the AFL-CIO Maritime Trades Department; Maritime Administrator David Matsuda; RADM Mark H. Buzby, commander of the U.S. Navy's Military Sealift Command; RADM William D. Baumgartner, U.S. Coast Guard 7th District, Miami; and Anthony Naccarato, co-chair of AMO Plans and president of the Washington-based American Maritime Officers Service.
These speakers struck separate yet common themes: the wartime roles of the privately owned and operated U.S. merchant fleet and civilian American merchant mariners; the contributions made to the Dania Beach and South Florida communities by AMO; our union's remarkable rise and sustained security over 62 often turbulent years; our union's leadership on national maritime policy in the Executive and Legislative Branches of the federal government; the impact of regulation on the ability of merchant mariners to do their jobs and advance in their careers.
Speaking on behalf of the AMO national executive board, I opened the program by dedicating the beautiful structure to all deep-sea, Great Lakes and inland waters AMO members, and by explaining that the new building is a far more fitting symbol of the unmatched quality AMO members represent.
I also pointed out that seagoing AMO members - not AMO officials, representatives or employees - had performed the symbolic groundbreaking to begin the project, and that seagoing AMO members had approved construction of the building in a 90-day union-wide secret ballot policy referendum in 2009. This referendum was not required under the AMO National Constitution, but I wanted AMO members to make the call - they had done so much to secure our union's superior standing, and I wanted their collective voice heard on this important initiative.
In addition, I reaffirmed my administration's commitment to continued sound financial management and to ever-increasing operating efficiency, a cause made easier in several ways by the new building. The structure and the land are owned outright by AMO, so the operating expenses will be minimal. Having all administrative departments under one roof will result in additional substantial savings (lower utility bills, for example), and our union will no longer have to rent space from AMO Plans for monthly AMO membership meetings and other union functions.
The day before the grand opening, I chaired the inaugural regularly scheduled AMO headquarters monthly membership meeting in the new space. During the meeting, I was honored to welcome Florida Democratic Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, who offered congratulations and continued support to AMO.
Upon adjournment, I was privileged to unveil a plaque to be mounted in the lobby of the new building. "Dedicated with admiration, respect and gratitude to the men and women of American Maritime Officers, the nation's largest union of merchant marine officers," the plaque reads. "We pledge ourselves to a level of service equal to the standards of excellence set each day by the finest licensed seagoing professionals in the world."
To me, the plaque says it all.