By Willie Barrere
National President
It has been a little more than a year since I took the helm at AMO. It’s been fascinating – a tremendous amount to learn, both inside and out. We continue moving forward and in a positive direction.
There are several new developments and I’ll cover some of them here. There is more new in the making and we are working closely with operating companies, elected officials, and others to achieve outcomes before making announcements.
We have new ships. AMO officers are onboard the SL Midway – a replacement vessel for the Magothy that was reflagged in February.
AMO is also onboard the American Energy – Crowley’s Jones Act LNG tanker, which will operate between the U.S. mainland and Puerto Rico. We are expecting an official announcement in March.
AMO is onboard the Charybdis – a wind turbine installation vessel nearing completion in Texas. Vessel crewing is being done by Atlas, a relatively new company for AMO.
AMO is onboard two new VAM ships in Norfolk that were purchased for service in the Ready Reserve Force – the Cape San Roman and the Cape Suarez Point.
AMO officers are onboard the newly reflagged vessel Allied Brooklyn, which is operated by a new AMO-contracted company, Federated Maritime.
In Oregon, AMO officers are preparing to move the USS Simanek to the East Coast. AMO officers began manning this vessel last fall with OSI as the operator.
In April, we expect to officer-up another Tanker Security Program ship in the fleet. This one will be operated by Argent.
An expansion of the TSP has been authorized by law. The program currently numbers 10 ships. We expect our contracted companies to be competing for slots when funding for the expansion of the fleet is appropriated at some point in the future.
AMO-contracted company TOTE is the construction manager for the NSMV school ships and also has an operating contract for three of them. When they are deployed for special missions, AMO officers man them.
We have a new agreement with American Steamship Company for winter work as covered employment during layup on the Great Lakes and AMO members are working on the company’s thousand-footers this winter in various rotations.
We continue to work with our contracted companies on bidding for new projects and new opportunities in various markets.
On the downside, we lost a few vessels last year, and we will lose Sealift’s SSG Edward A. Carter in March as the APS3 military program is eliminated.
AMO and Sealift Inc. worked with other unions and companies to fight this approach to military downsizing in DC, but the U.S. Army is looking to save money to put into future projects as the military focuses on new and evolving missions. This new direction by the military initially brought on the development of the Tanker Security Program, along with a lot of successful work by AMO and AMOS on Capitol Hill.
As you know, there is a new President and a new administration and a lot of change happening very quickly in DC.
For the U.S. Merchant Marine, this brought about the suspension of U.S. food-aid shipments, followed almost as quickly by a waiver for emergency food aid. AMO, AMOS, and other maritime interests, as well as U.S. farmers, have been involved in intense discussions with Congress and the administration from day one. As of now, all Food for Peace shipments that have already been contracted and placed at terminals or loaded on vessels can be completed but no new contracts will be approved through USAID. In Congress, we are actively supporting Republican-sponsored bills that would transfer the Food for Peace and Food for Progress programs to the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
Contributing to the AMO Voluntary Political Action Fund on a regular basis is an excellent way for our members to participate in support of the Jones Act and various maritime laws. There are programs we need to help make sure survive this transformative time in our nation, and there are opportunities for new work and expansion for American mariners. We need to support the lawmakers who support the U.S. Merchant Marine in these and other regards and we need your help to do it.
In February, AMO hired a new dispatcher, Shawn Stone, to augment our Dispatch team as we continue to increase our job totals. We will be bringing in our new East Coast representative – Marrisa Capp – in March. She is currently sailing as chief engineer and is due off her ship soon.
Across the street, the STAR Center recently bought the equipment and course material for a new GWO training class so we can train our officers locally for the wind farm industry. This will start up later in the year.
STAR Center will also be increasing the class enrollment for the TECH and OICEW programs.
We are continuing to work with MEBA and MMP on our pass-throughs in order to keep our vessels moving and we are all filling in billets as needed.
AMO is bringing in new staff to assist with our social media outreach. You can follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and LinkedIn. These social media sites are a start in helping us raise awareness of our industry. With more new jobs, we need more new officers.
So far this year, we have reduced the jobs sitting open on the board by about 75 percent. We are continuing to make much needed improvements to the internal dispatching system we inherited from the past administration. And we are expanding the recruiting efforts that were launched by members of this NEB. We must connect more members and applicants with jobs on AMO-contracted vessels.
I am really pleased to report numerous AMO officers are reaching out to get material for high school presentations. We are developing Power Point slides for future presentations by our members and have a huge project underway for bringing in a new generation of mariners working with high school guidance counselors from across the nation. It will be our second year of participation and the first year most of the rest of the maritime industry will be joining us, thanks to the work of AMO and STAR Center.
We have more members, new ships, new companies, more recruiting, and new outreach. With our newly negotiated contracts, there is more money being paid to our members than this time last year. The AMO Executive Board continues working to improve our union operations with the goal of being the number one choice for licensed mariners. Thank you all for your continued support.