[House Hearing, 110 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
MARINER EDUCATION AND WORKFORCE
=======================================================================
(110-79)
HEARING
BEFORE THE
SUBCOMMITTEE ON
COAST GUARD AND MARITIME TRANSPORTATION
OF THE
COMMITTEE ON
TRANSPORTATION AND INFRASTRUCTURE
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED TENTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
__________
OCTOBER 17, 2007
__________
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Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure
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COMMITTEE ON TRANSPORTATION AND INFRASTRUCTURE
JAMES L. OBERSTAR, Minnesota, Chairman
NICK J. RAHALL, II, West Virginia, JOHN L. MICA, Florida
Vice Chair DON YOUNG, Alaska
PETER A. DeFAZIO, Oregon THOMAS E. PETRI, Wisconsin
JERRY F. COSTELLO, Illinois HOWARD COBLE, North Carolina
ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, District of JOHN J. DUNCAN, Jr., Tennessee
Columbia WAYNE T. GILCHREST, Maryland
JERROLD NADLER, New York VERNON J. EHLERS, Michigan
CORRINE BROWN, Florida STEVEN C. LaTOURETTE, Ohio
BOB FILNER, California RICHARD H. BAKER, Louisiana
EDDIE BERNICE JOHNSON, Texas FRANK A. LoBIONDO, New Jersey
GENE TAYLOR, Mississippi JERRY MORAN, Kansas
ELIJAH E. CUMMINGS, Maryland GARY G. MILLER, California
ELLEN O. TAUSCHER, California ROBIN HAYES, North Carolina
LEONARD L. BOSWELL, Iowa HENRY E. BROWN, Jr., South
TIM HOLDEN, Pennsylvania Carolina
BRIAN BAIRD, Washington TIMOTHY V. JOHNSON, Illinois
RICK LARSEN, Washington TODD RUSSELL PLATTS, Pennsylvania
MICHAEL E. CAPUANO, Massachusetts SAM GRAVES, Missouri
JULIA CARSON, Indiana BILL SHUSTER, Pennsylvania
TIMOTHY H. BISHOP, New York JOHN BOOZMAN, Arkansas
MICHAEL H. MICHAUD, Maine SHELLEY MOORE CAPITO, West
BRIAN HIGGINS, New York Virginia
RUSS CARNAHAN, Missouri JIM GERLACH, Pennsylvania
JOHN T. SALAZAR, Colorado MARIO DIAZ-BALART, Florida
GRACE F. NAPOLITANO, California CHARLES W. DENT, Pennsylvania
DANIEL LIPINSKI, Illinois TED POE, Texas
DORIS O. MATSUI, California DAVID G. REICHERT, Washington
NICK LAMPSON, Texas CONNIE MACK, Florida
ZACHARY T. SPACE, Ohio JOHN R. `RANDY' KUHL, Jr., New
MAZIE K. HIRONO, Hawaii York
BRUCE L. BRALEY, Iowa LYNN A WESTMORELAND, Georgia
JASON ALTMIRE, Pennsylvania CHARLES W. BOUSTANY, Jr.,
TIMOTHY J. WALZ, Minnesota Louisiana
HEATH SHULER, North Carolina JEAN SCHMIDT, Ohio
MICHAEL A. ACURI, New York CANDICE S. MILLER, Michigan
HARRY E. MITCHELL, Arizona THELMA D. DRAKE, Virginia
CHRISTOPHER P. CARNEY, Pennsylvania MARY FALLIN, Oklahoma
JOHN J. HALL, New York VERN BUCHANAN, Florida
STEVE KAGEN, Wisconsin
STEVE COHEN, Tennessee
JERRY McNERNEY, California
LAURA A. RICHARDSON, California
(ii)
SUBCOMMITTEE ON COAST GUARD AND MARITIME TRANSPORTATION
ELIJAH E. CUMMINGS, Maryland, Chairman
GENE TAYLOR, Mississippi STEVEN C. LaTOURETTE, Ohio
RICK LARSEN, Washington DON YOUNG, Alaska
CORRINE BROWN, Florida HOWARD COBLE, North Carolina
BRIAN HIGGINS, New York WAYNE T. GILCHREST, Maryland
BRIAN BAIRD, Washington FRANK A. LoBIONDO, New Jersey
TIMOTHY H. BISHOP, New York, Vice TED POE, Texas
Chair JOHN L. MICA, Florida
VACANCY (Ex Officio)
JAMES L. OBERSTAR, Minnesota
(Ex Officio)
(iii)
CONTENTS
Page
Summary of Subject Matter........................................ vi
TESTIMONY
Annessa, Carl, COO/Vice President for Operations, Hornbeck
Offshore Services for Offshore Marine Service Association...... 29
Beacom, Captain William, Navigation Consultant, Professional
Mariner........................................................ 29
Connaughton, Sean, Administrator, MARAD.......................... 6
Craine, Jr., Admiral John, Jr. USN, Retired, President, S.U.N.Y.
Maritime College............................................... 29
Eriksson, Berit, Former Executive Director, Pacific Coast
Maritime Consortium............................................ 44
Hammond, Cathy, CEO, Inland Marine Service for American Waterway
Operators...................................................... 29
Rodriguez, Michael, Executive Assistant to the President,
Masters, Mates and Pilots...................................... 29
Slesinger, Captain Jeff, Western Towboat Company, Chairperson,
Committee on Strategic Planning, Pacific Marine Towing Industry
Partners....................................................... 44
Sulzer, Captain Arthur H., USN, Retired, Board Member, Maritime
Academy Charter High School.................................... 44
Tellez, Augustin, Executive Vice President, Seafarers
International Union............................................ 44
Whitehead, Rear Admiral Joel, U.S. Coast Guard................... 6
PREPARED STATEMENT SUBMITTED BY MEMBERS OF CONGRESS
Bishop, Hon. Timothy H., of New York............................. 56
Cummings, Hon. Elijah E., of Maryland............................ 57
Oberstar, Hon. James L., of Minnesota............................ 63
PREPARED STATEMENTS SUBMITTED BY WITNESSES
Annessa, Carl.................................................... 66
Beacom, Capt. William............................................ 74
Connaughton, Sean T.............................................. 76
Craine, Jr., Admiral John W...................................... 86
Eriksson, Berit.................................................. 95
Hammond, Cathy................................................... 120
Rodriguez, Michael J............................................. 135
Slesinger, Capt. Jeff............................................ 143
Sulzer, Capt. Arthur H........................................... 152
Tellez, Augustin................................................. 166
Whitehead, Rear Admiral Joel..................................... 174
SUBMISSIONS FOR THE RECORD
Whitehead, Rear Admiral Joel, U.S. Coast Guard, response to
question from Rep. Taylor...................................... 21
ADDITIONS TO THE RECORD
Seamen's Church Institute, Eric K. Larsson, Director of Maritime
Training and Education, written statement...................... 187
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HEARING ON MARINER EDUCATION AND THE WORK FORCE
----------
Wednesday, October 17, 2007
House of Representatives
Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure,
Subcommittee on Coast Guard and Maritime Transportation,
Washington, DC.
The Subcommittee met, pursuant to call, at 10:00 a.m., in
Room 2165, Rayburn House Office Building, the Honorable Elijah
E. Cummings [Chairman of the Subcommittee] presiding.
Mr. Cummings. The Subcommittee will come to order.
Before we begin, I ask unanimous consent that Congresswoman
Laura Richardson may sit with the Subcommittee and participate
in this hearing, and without objection, it is so ordered. I am
hopeful that she will be joining us shortly, and I will say a
little bit more about her at that time.
Today, our Subcommittee convenes to consider two inter-
related topics that are of great importance to the future
success of the maritime industry. Specifically, we will examine
the nature, causes, and forecasts of labor shortages in the
industry, and we will examine trends and innovations in
maritime innovation.
According to the U.S. Department of Commerce, ports are the
gateways through which 80 percent of our Nation's foreign trade
enters our Country. Commerce in our Nation's maritime sector
accounts for approximately $750 billion of U.S. gross domestic
product.
Waterborne trade, which totaled 2.3 billion metric tons in
2005, is increasing at a startling rate, and the growth in
imported cargo, combined with our own domestic production, is
creating freight volumes that are straining our transportation
networks.
At the same time, significant changes continue to transform
the experience of working in the maritime industry.
No longer is the sailor's life necessarily one of
adventure, offering a young person the chance both to learn
about sailing through on-the-job experiences at sea while
occasionally spending weeks exploring port cities around the
world.
Deadlines and cost margins are tight and ships sail with
the fewest possible number of crew members, who are expected to
fulfill multiple duties while keeping regular watches, and who
usually spend no more than a few hours in any port.
The significant changes occurring in the maritime industry
appear to be contributing to labor shortages that, in turn,
threaten to further strain the industry.
The nature and extent of the shortages is not well
quantified and they appear to vary by type of mariner and type
of vessel. An important part of our job today is to understand
these shortages and to project their potential impact on the
various segments of the U.S. maritime industry.
Based on data the United States Maritime Administration has
provided, however, we know that the average age of a mariner
with a Masters license is 51, while the average age of a Chief
Engineer is 50. Figures also suggest that nearly 30 percent of
inland mariners will be eligible to retire in the near future.
There are likely many factors that can contribute to a
labor shortage in the maritime industry, and just as the extent
of the shortages is not known, the impact of each factor is
difficult to assess.
Certainly, the lifestyle associated with the maritime
industry presents unique challenges. While the lure of the sea
has been a siren song to many throughout the ages, many people
are also lured by the call of home, and they may prefer to
relax with their families at the end of the day rather than
retire to a small cabin at the end of a hard shift. Wage
differentials between jobs at sea and jobs on land may
contribute to shortages, particularly when combined with the
lifestyle challenges of life on the water.
Further, significant new standards for training and
continuing education have been applied to mariners through the
1995 amendments to the Convention on the Standards of Training,
Certification, and Watchkeeping.
These standards serve the critical goal of improving safety
in the maritime industry and reducing human factors as the
causes of maritime accidents, but they have also had the effect
of imposing expensive and time-consuming training requirements
on mariners, particularly on unlicensed mariners seeking to
climb their way up the hawsepipe to command a ship.
There are certainly outstanding facilities in the United
States that help train individuals to enter the maritime
industry and to advance in their careers, such as the Paul Hall
Center for Maritime Training in Piney Point, Maryland, run by
the Seafarers International Union, which I have had the honor
of visiting, and the Maritime Institute of Technology and
Graduate Studies associated with the Masters, Mates, and Pilots
Union, which I have also had the honor of visiting.
However, attendance at such facilities can be expensive and
require a significant commitment of time that maritime
schedules may not allow a mariner to easily make.
Further, we need to assess whether current maritime
education programs have the capacity to meet the demand of
those who are just now entering the maritime industry.
In short, our hearing today is intended to enable us to
draw a comprehensive picture of the personnel situation of the
U.S. maritime industry.
Our examination will inform the future development of
policies needed to ensure that our Nation has the labor we need
to keep maritime commerce flowing and to ensure that those
contemplating working on the water will have the chance to
advance along a career path that brings them new opportunities.
Before I recognize the Ranking Member, I also want to
discuss for one moment a trend in maritime education that is of
significance to me, and that is the growth or, I might say, re-
growth of maritime-themed high schools across the Nation.
In his written testimony, Captain Art Sulzer, who will
appear on our third panel, has presented a very comprehensive
discussion of the past history of high school-level maritime
education as well as the successes of and challenges faced by
new maritime-themed high schools being created today.
Shortly after becoming Chair of this Subcommittee, I
learned that my own city of Baltimore had established a
maritime-themed high school some five or six years ago.
After visiting the school, I learned that it had been
achieving impressive test results and graduation rates, but the
school system had not made the investments necessary to ensure
that the school was truly offering a maritime education and
could prepare students for work in the maritime industry.
Over the past summer, I have been working closely with a
very dedicated group of individuals from the Baltimore maritime
community, including former Congresswoman Helen Bentley, to
ensure that the promise inherent in the school's name, Maritime
Industries Academy, was fulfilled and that students could
receive a maritime education that would be meaningful.
We have succeeded in revitalizing the school's Junior Naval
ROTC program and have introduced a guest lecture series to
bring the maritime community into the school.
We are poised to achieve even greater results with the
creation of a new advisory board that will guide the school
through the process of applying for a charter, which will
hopefully give the school the flexibility it needs to support
an expansive maritime curriculum.
I want to briefly acknowledge the significant contributions
that many of those who are joining us today are making to the
development of this project, including Administrator
Connaughton and his staff members, Sharon LeGrand, Shannon
Russell, and Richard Corley, who continue to bring the
resources of the Federal Government to support this school.
MARAD also put us in touch with Captain Sulzer, who has been a
key advisor. I also want to pay special tribute to Dick
Fredericks for his hard work. I also thank Mr. Mike Rodriguez,
Walt Megonigal, and the Masters, Mates, and Pilots Union and
its MITAGS institution; Augustin Tellez and the Seafarers
International Union; and Admiral Craine, the President of the
New York Maritime Academy, which is creating a new partnership
for maritime high schools in which I look forward to having
Baltimore Maritime Industries Academy participate.
Every time I visit the school, whose advancement has become
a top priority for me, I see first-hand the challenges, but I
also see the possibilities of maritime education and I gain a
new kind of insight into the maritime industry that I frankly
have not received from any other source.
My experience with this school also makes the subject of
today's hearing very personal to me.
I am truly hopeful that school districts around the Country
can benefit from the lessons that those who are testifying
today are learning regarding how best to support the
development of maritime schools and open such schools in their
local communities.
I look forward to the testimony of our witnesses, and now I
yield to our distinguished Ranking Member, Congressman
LaTourette.
Mr. LaTourette. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, for the
recognition. I have to apologize this morning for being a
little bleary eyed. It took longer for the Cleveland Indians to
dispatch the Boston Red Sox than I had hoped last night.
[Laughter.]
Mr. LaTourette. This morning, the Subcommittee will hear
from several witnesses on the state of the maritime workforce
and the recommendations for enhancements and initiatives to
attract and retain workers in the maritime trades. Our Nation's
economy depends on a well trained and skilled maritime
workforce, and I look forward to hearing the witnesses'
suggestions.
Earlier this year, I introduced H.R. 1605, which was titled
the Merchant Mariner Credentials Improvement Act of 2007. I am
very grateful to you, Chairman Cummings, and also to Chairman
Oberstar, for including this bill as a part of the larger Coast
Guard authorization bill, and I look forward to working with
both of you to enact those provisions in the law.
These provisions include common sense changes to the Coast
Guard's documentation and licensing processes. The bill would
authorize maritime workers to renew their documents and
licenses before their existing credentials expire, allow the
Coast Guard to temporarily extend the validity of credentials,
and reduce the number of times that maritime workers would be
required to appear in person and be finger-printed for Federal
documents.
The bill also would allow newly hired workers to start
working in an interim clearance status before they receive the
transportation worker identification card. Lastly, the bill
recognizes the impacts that a shortage in the number of
merchant mariners would have on the U.S. fleet, our economy,
and our national security. I look forward to hearing the
thoughts of our witnesses on all of the panels today on how
such a shortage can be prevented.
Again, Mr. Chairman, I want to thank you for holding this
important hearing, and I thank the witnesses in advance for
their testimony, and yield back.
Mr. Cummings. Mr. Baird.
Mr. Baird. I thank the Chairman for holding this meeting.
The problem you are addressing today is part of a problem
throughout the transportation industry, and I will just make a
brief plug. Phil English and I have created a caucus called the
Career and Technical Education Caucus to address precisely
these concerns.
And though I am a former university professor, back home I
hear more requests for people who can drive diesel trucks,
repair diesel engines, hang drywall, fix electrical wiring,
etc., than I hear for liberal arts majors. Nothing against the
liberal arts majors in the crowd, including myself, but we need
to do a lot more for career and tech ed in this Country. We
have a paradox of people worried about jobs being exported
overseas. Even as employers today, with high-paying jobs, can't
find skilled workers to fill those jobs. So I would hope that
this is the first of a series, perhaps, of hearings we have on
this issue of the need for a skilled workforce.
Finally, I would urge Members on both sides, when we talk
about the importance of making a college education more
affordable, to add the words career and technical education,
because there are well-paying, decent jobs that people can put
food on their table for their families and serve this Country
quite well, and we need to give career and tech ed every bit as
much status as we give to college education.
I yield back. Thank you.
Mr. Cummings. Thank you very much, Mr. Baird.
Mr. Coble.
Mr. Coble. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Very brief opening
statement.
Good to have you all with us this morning, gentlemen,
Admiral.
An issue I want to determine, and I think will be addressed
today, Mr. Chairman, is whether or not the Federal Government
has a responsibility to provide training or to ensure the
availability of training for mariners working in the private
sector. I suspect that will be addressed by one or both of our
witnesses, and I thank you for having the hearing, Mr.
Chairman.
Mr. Cummings. Mr. Bishop.
Mr. Bishop. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you for holding
this hearing. In the interest of time, I will submit my opening
statement for the record.
Mr. Cummings. Thank you very much, Mr. Bishop.
Mr. Gilchrest.
Mr. Gilchrest. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. A couple of brief
remarks, buttressing what previous Members have said about the
need for engineers down to dock workers in the maritime
industry. By the year 2020, I understand the volume of cargo is
going to double, the number of vessels will double, but the
number of ports will probably diminish; and the concentration
of that cargo going into those ports is going to require the
best kind of intellect that the engineers, the dock workers,
and we have to offer.
I would hope that during the course--and there is no
question that education in the whole range of the maritime
industry is necessary and we need to put our best people into
that and our best efforts, and back it up with dollars to make
those opportunities possible, because they are essential and
the American public utterly depends on the maritime industry
for virtually everything they purchase at our stores.
As we go through this, though, this that we are describing
today is human activity, and it is human activity impacting,
more than likely, in a degrading fashion, on very limited
resources, that is, the environment; and the ecology, the
environment upon which we ultimately depend, is only now as
resilient as our understanding of that ecology is. So as we go
through the fact that we need technical schooling, we need
engineers, all the way down to dock workers, every one of those
individuals needs to also understand their place, the impact
this industry has on those vital natural resources. So human
activity is important in this maritime industry, but it also
needs to be and can be compatible with nature's design.
I represent the Chesapeake Bay, and we are also discussing,
and more often than not disputing, where dredging needs to take
place, where a whole range of other activities concerning
ballast water, invasive species, all of these things need to
take place. We now know enough information so we don't have to
sacrifice the Chesapeake Bay so people in Missouri and
Minnesota and Colorado and Maryland can have the goods they
need to purchase to improve the quality of their life.
So as we go through this process, an understanding of where
we fit in nature's design will certainly benefit our posterity.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Cummings. Thank you very much, Mr. Gilchrest.
Mr. Poe.
Mr. Poe. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I am concerned about how
we got in this situation. If we know how we got in this
situation, maybe we can rectify it and not continue to be, in
my opinion, a dire situation. Also, has the Federal Government,
with its regulations, made this worse or is it making it
better? I would like some candid answers on the role of the
Federal Government; does it get in the way or does it help.
And with that, Mr. Chairman, I will yield back. Thank you.
Mr. Cummings. Thank you very much.
That being the end of the opening statements, we will now
hear from Admiral Joel Whitehead, Commander of the Coast
Guard's Eighth District, and Mr. Sean Connaughton,
Administrator of the United States Maritime Administration.
Thank you, gentlemen, for being with us. You will have five
minutes to provide a summary of your testimony and then we will
have some questions.
TESTIMONY OF REAR ADMIRAL JOEL WHITEHEAD, U.S. COAST GUARD;
SEAN CONNAUGHTON, ADMINISTRATOR, MARAD
Admiral Whitehead. Good morning, Mr. Chairman and
distinguished Members of the Subcommittee. I am Admiral Joel
Whitehead, Commander of the Eighth Coast Guard District in New
Orleans. The Eighth Coast Guard District is the largest of nine
Coast Guard districts and covers 26 States, more than 1200
miles of coastline, and 10,300 miles of inland waterways from
Florida to Mexico and including the entire navigable lengths of
the Mississippi, Ohio, Missouri, Illinois, and Tennessee River
systems. I am pleased to have this opportunity to be with you
today and to discuss the Coast Guard's role in maritime
education and workforce.
The Coast Guard sets standards of training and
qualification for seafarers and administers the Mariner
Licensing and Documentation program in compliance with domestic
and international laws. The aim of the Mariner Licensing and
Documentation program is to ensure that the U.S. merchant
marine vessels are manned by qualified, trained, and competent
personnel.
In 1978, the International Maritime Organization adopted
the Standards of Training, Certification, and Watchkeeping for
Seafarers Convention of 1978. The U.S. deferred ratification
efforts and worked for over a decade to make the necessary
changes to our licensing regulations to comply with the
Convention. The U.S. became party to the STCW Convention in
1991.
The STCW Convention was significantly amended in 1995. The
amendments were comprehensive and detailed, resulting in more
consistent training worldwide. Competence-based standards were
established that placed emphasis on the requirements for
training and assessment of skills in almost every facet of a
mariner's profession.
To meet our Convention obligations, the Coast Guard
published an interim rule on June 26th, 1997, implementing the
1995 amendments. The rule retained the existing licensing
structure in the United States; it incorporated the STCW
training and practical demonstrations of skill requirements,
and included oversight of the training. This rule impacted
mariners serving on commercial seagoing vessels of over 200
gross registered tons, whether operating on domestic or
international voyages, and resulted in increased training costs
to the mariners. Mariners serving on seagoing vessels of less
than 200 gross registered tons on domestic voyages and mariners
serving on non-seagoing vessels, such as inland towing vessels,
were not impacted by the rule.
The Coast Guard is currently reviewing the 1997 interim
rule and is considering seeking additional comments to ensure
that we continue to meet our obligations under the Convention.
The review is necessary to incorporate lessons learned during
the 10-year implementation period, to clarify issues that
generated confusion to mariners, to address the comments on the
interim rule, and to address recommendations from the 2003
independent evaluation of the credentialing and licensing
program.
In January of 2007, the IMO began a comprehensive review of
the STCW Convention that will take several years to complete.
The review is restricted to a limited number of issues to avoid
any unnecessary amendments or reduction of the very successful
training regime and subsequent impact to industry. The
comprehensive review presents an opportunity to look for
alternative training approaches not considered during the 1995
amendments that may help alleviate the burdens imposed by the
implementation of STCW.
The Coast Guard has engaged the Department of Homeland
Security's Merchant Marine Personnel Advisory Committee, or
MERPAC, to provide recommendations on the issues to assist in
the development of the positions for the United States.
The Coast Guard has also partnered with MARAD to oversee
and evaluate the implementation of STCW by the U.S. Merchant
Marine Academy and the six State maritime academies.
Furthermore, the Coast Guard has supported and fostered
discussions on mariner recruitment and retention to address
training related issues that would contribute to the shortage
of qualified U.S. mariners.
The Coast Guard believes that the STCW has significantly
enhanced the safety and security of the United States by
requiring foreign vessels calling on our waters to be manned
with competent crews. The Coast Guard does recognize that
implementing the requirements of the STCW Convention for U.S.
seagoing vessels has imposed a financial burden on our
mariners, and we continue to examine methods that may
potentially reduce some of the challenges associated with the
implementation of the STCW requirements.
The Coast Guard is also undergoing several initiatives that
aim to positively impact industry, and for the past 12 months
the Coast Guard has been proceeding with its project to
restructure and centralize the mariner licensing and
documentation program. Since June, the National Maritime Center
has been focused on improving its internal customer services
processes to issue mariner licenses and documents faster and
with a higher degree of accuracy and consistency.
In August, as a result of the process improvements, the NMC
reduced the inventory of credential applications being
processed by 39 percent and issued over 2,000 mariner
credentials, reaching a new production record. While the
overall processing time remains higher than desired, the
average license renewal processing time has decreased by 25
percent since June.
I thank you for this opportunity to discuss maritime
education and workforce, and I would be pleased to answer any
questions you may have.
Mr. Cummings. Thank you very much.
Mr. Connaughton.
Mr. Connaughton. Mr. Chairman, Mr. LaTourette, Members of
the Subcommittee, it is a great pleasure for me to be here
today to talk to you about some of the challenges that we are
facing, but also some of the great opportunities that people
have if they enter into the maritime industry and what a great
career it is. Mr. Chairman, I have a prepared statement I would
like to enter into the record and summarize my remarks, sir.
Mr. Cummings. So ordered.
Mr. Connaughton. As you mentioned, sir, we are facing some
challenges today, primarily due to, first, the strength of the
American economy, the fact that we are seeing enormous
recapitalization in the maritime industry, particularly in the
brown-water fleet, the offshore industry, and the coastwise
fleets. These have obviously meant that we are seeing a greater
demand for waterborne transportation and also the people that
man the vessels.
But, in addition, we also are facing some challenges when
you look at the actual personnel themselves. First is
retirements; the second is that many people are not necessarily
perceiving maritime industry as a career; regulatory hurdles;
and other types of concerns, particularly in the
criminalization of certain types of acts of accidents have made
going to sea or going and working in the maritime industry less
attractive than it was in the past.
In addition, we are also seeing an enormous challenge
internationally with the shortage of mariners practically
around the world. In fact, we are looking at most of the
industry very actively recruiting mariners of every different
nationality, and we are seeing that actually in the United
States with foreign companies coming to the United States and
actively recruiting American mariners.
The Maritime Administration runs several programs that this
Committee oversees regarding the training of mariners. The most
prominent is the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy, which is part of
our Administration. We currently have around 1,000 cadets and
graduate a little over 200 every year. Also, we are very much
involved in the education and the programs of the State
maritime colleges; we provide the training ships as well as
direct payments to the schools and individuals through the
student incentive payment program.
We do provide some post-graduate types of training through
the Merchant Marine Academy's GMAT School. But, obviously, for
the most part, these programs have been very much focused on
the deep sea mariner and not necessarily the different types of
challenges that we are facing today in the United States,
particularly in the brown-water industry and the offshore
industry.
What we have been trying to do, sir, is since these--I have
been in office just about a year, and, traveling quite a bit, I
have started hearing, anecdotally, many of these concerns being
raised by employers and mariners about some of the challenges
they are facing. One of the first things that we are trying to
do is get out a survey to the industry to actually get some
data behind some of this anecdotal information. We are nearing
the final stages in getting that approved and out to the
industry.
Also, we have actually upgraded what we call the mariner
outreach system, which allows mariners to actually come in and
file with us so we can keep track of what is happening,
particularly in the offshore and the deep sea industry. Right
now, we have around 41,000 mariners who have signed up for that
program.
We are reaching out to many of the industry associations
and labor management, labor organizations, to work with them
and get a better handle about what is happening in the
industry. We are trying to find expanded opportunities with the
Department of Labor. We have been working with them initially
with the shipyard industry, because, obviously, in this
recapitalization that we are experiencing in the industry, they
are having the same types of challenges, finding and keeping
shipyard workers; and we have actually been able to take some
initial steps in setting up some nationwide programs to help
the shipyard industry, and now we are trying to explore whether
we can take that and potentially deal with it and bring it out
to the mariner community as well.
One of the things that we continually find some challenges
with is finding training opportunities for our cadets at the
Merchant Marine Academy and also at the State maritime schools,
so we have been reaching out to the broader maritime community
to see if we can get more cadet berths. I am happy to report
that we have had the first agreement signed just this week with
an Overseas Shipholding Group, which will potentially open up
at least 100 more ships to mariners, primary in the foreign
flag, but it is an American company.
We also have some other American companies which have
sizeable fleets who have indicated that they are willing to
take American cadets onboard so we can start to get more people
trained, because one of the challenges that we are facing is
that one of the biggest limitations for the expansion of the
enrollment in many of the State maritime schools is the fact
that we have training ships for them, but they are limited in
their capacity, and because we can't expand the capacity of
those vessels, necessarily, we have to look for some of these
other opportunities if we want to actually get more people
going to the schools and graduating with licenses.
In addition, the cadets, graduates from the Merchant Marine
Academy and those students from the State maritime schools who
actually take the student incentive payments from us have a
certain obligation that is in the law. Part of that obligation
is obviously to keep their license for six years and go to sea.
What I have done is change the obligation to allow the service
in the brown-water inland industry to meet that obligation, so
that students know that, once they graduate, they can actually
go to work in the inland industry and then meet the obligations
that they incurred.
Also what we are working very diligently on is, as you
mentioned, Mr. Chairman, working with some of these high
schools programs, because we think that one of the things is
making our youth aware of the maritime industry and the
opportunities that exist and the career that now exists in the
industry. If we can get to them early, get them those skills,
get them that familiarization, that will hopefully make them
more interested in going to sea and going to work in the
maritime industry. So we are trying to get to them as early as
possible.
In our recent realignment of the maritime industry, we
actually did establish an office that is completely dedicated
to workforce development. Sharon LeGrand, who you mentioned, is
actually part of that office, and that office's whole purpose
is really to work on some of these program and policy issues
and do much more outreach so we can end up, again, getting a
much more consistent approach on how we go after some of these
workforce development issues.
We are also working very diligently to revise our own
regulations. These regulations that we have today that govern
the State schools, govern the Merchant Marine Academy, our
training programs, is well over 20 years old. The challenges
that those regulations were originally developed in are not the
challenges we are facing today, so we will hopefully be coming
out with some revised regulations early next year.
So, Mr. Chairman, these are some great challenges, but
incredible opportunities. Particularly, I just want to leave
one thought, an act that this Subcommittee took a few years
ago. The Committee came forward with some revisions to the
Deepwater Port Act. Those changes allowed us to broach the
subject of taking American mariners and American flagged
vessels in this growing LNG trade. I am very happy to report
that we now have commitments from two companies to start to
take onboard American mariners onboard the LNG vessels calling
in the United States. We have a commitment from another
company, Woodside Natural Gas, to actually have two American
flagged LNGs if their deepwater port license is approved, and
we believe we will shortly be announcing another company's
commitment to have an American flagged LNG as well. So, again,
some great opportunities that are there for us if we are
willing to try to go out and take it.
So it is a great pleasure for me to be here. Again, we have
got challenges, but we have got some great opportunities for
the men and women who are in the maritime industry that can
have a great career ahead. Thank you, sir.
Mr. Cummings. Thank you very much, Mr. Connaughton.
A little bit earlier in the hearing I had asked unanimous
consent that Congresswoman Laura Richardson sit with our
Subcommittee to participate in this hearing and it was ordered.
She is with us now, and in the way of introduction,
Congresswoman Richardson has been elected to represent the 37th
District of California, formerly represented by our
distinguished colleague, Ms. Juanita Millender-McDonald, who
was a dedicated Member of the Transportation Committee and of
this Subcommittee.
While Ms. Richardson has been assigned to the
Transportation Committee, her Subcommittee assignments have not
yet been announced, but we eagerly anticipate she will serve on
our Subcommittee, and we welcome her to her first hearing with
us today.
Ms. Richardson's district includes the Alameda Corridor,
which provides transportation to and from the Port of Long
Beach, one of our most vital ports, and she has previously
worked on transportation issues both as a member of the
California Assembly and the Long Beach City Council. I know she
understands from the unique position of her district the
transportation challenges we confront as a Nation, and she
shares our Subcommittee's concern to ensure that our Nation's
maritime industry is as strong as it can be.
So, to Ms. Richardson, we welcome you, and I will yield to
you for a response.
Ms. Richardson. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I appreciate
that very kind welcome by both yourself and the Committee.
You know, it was kind of interesting when I went back to
school and got my master's in business, I had an opportunity to
choose to go overseas and study goods movement and trade in
China, so I have been both to Hong Kong, Shanghai, and Beijing,
and have had an opportunity to see their tremendous growth,
which also impacts how we move forward in this Nation.
As was stated by the Chairman, coming from the 37th
Congressional District, I noted in the background that we
expect an increase doubling of our cargo over the next five
years, and it states that the majority of that will be in very
concentrated areas. And I guess I should say either
congratulations or challenges to me, because I happen to
represent 45 percent of the entire Nation's cargo goes through
my district.
So we will be gladly working with this Committee to carry,
I think, really, something that is going to be good for this
Country if we do it wisely, and I look forward to future
legislation that we will enact to enable that the maritime
industry is very successful.
With that, Mr. Chairman, count on me, and I hope to make
you very proud, and my other colleagues, by my representation.
Mr. Cummings. Thank you very much.
Now to the five minute questioning.
Mr. Connaughton, you talked about the survey of U.S.
vessels operating in the industry and you mentioned in your
testimony it would be completed fairly soon, I think you said,
that it was in its final stages. As I am sure you are well
aware, this Committee deals with timetables and deadlines
because we are concerned that if we don't do that, nothing gets
done. So we want to make sure you give us a timetable so we can
hold you to that. What is it?
Mr. Connaughton. Well----
Mr. Cummings. I am not trying to put you on the spot, but--
--
[Laughter.]
Mr. Cummings.--but I am very serious about that. We have
one life to live--this is no dress rehearsal--and we try to get
things done. So we don't want to be here 10 years from now
talking about the survey, when you are off to another job.
Mr. Connaughton. Well, Mr. Chairman, I appreciate the
question because I thought we--well, there is a process that we
must follow, as a government agency, to go out and request any
information from the public and from business. We have been
working very diligently to get that survey through that
process. We initially had to publish in the Federal Register a
notice that we were going to do the survey. We have gotten that
through the system. We are now down to the point of where we
have had now to get the actual questions cleared through the
system, and it is our hope that that process will be completed
in the next several weeks. Our goal was to get it out much
sooner than this; it is just that the system is the system.
So I would like to tell you that we would--our goal is to
have it out by December 1st.
Mr. Cummings. All right.
Mr. Connaughton. And we will keep you very much informed,
sir, of what the status is.
Mr. Cummings. And we will be talking on the last day of
November.
Mr. Connaughton. Yes, sir.
[Laughter.]
Mr. Cummings. Let me ask you this. Let me go to something
that you said that I found very interesting, when you talked
about high schools. There are only a few maritime high schools
in our Country, and it concerns many Members of Congress that
we have so many young people who don't even know, don't have a
clue, about the jobs in the maritime industry. I think one of
my colleagues said it a few minutes ago, where people can get a
job and make sufficient funds to support their families and,
sadly, I think we don't start young enough. In other words, we
don't expose them early enough. And I am just wondering,
considering there are only a few high schools now, do you have
any goals to try to reach out to various school districts?
You know, the trend in the Nation today is to have these
specialized high schools. In Baltimore, they have got them for
homeland security, they have got them for firefighters, all
kinds of different things, technology, and I am just wondering
what are we doing, considering the fact that this is an
industry--and I have read your testimony, which was well done,
by the way, and it talks about the needs and projects the
needs. But I am just wondering, at the end of your tenure, do
you have a goal of addressing that issue, and to what extent,
under your watch?
Mr. Connaughton. Mr. Chairman, it is amazing to me to see
where we are today with regard to demand and the interest in
mariners, in American mariners. One of the things, as I have
gone around the Country, I have had the opportunity to meet
with people in New Orleans, Charleston, our folks have met with
yours in Baltimore, as well as up in New York about the
interest in starting up some of these programs. There are
already some of these high school programs. The issue is how do
we come up with potentially a model curriculum to get some of
these programs, which still use or say that they are maritime,
that are not necessarily in that direction any more, even
though they may use that title.
It is now the fact that we can point to them that they have
a career and they have opportunities. Here we are, just three
or four months after the graduations from all the State
schools, Kings Point, and we are looking at 85 percent of the
graduates afloat or in the military, and another 12 to 13
percent with some significant short-side jobs; and the salaries
are just simply tremendous. I mean, what we are looking at is,
anecdotally, everything from $50,000 to over $100,000 are being
earned by these graduates, and the demand is there and the
salaries are there, and trying to reach out to America's youth,
which just Mr. Baird, I think, mentioned about how difficult is
in technical--I know my previous position was in local
government, and we had a very difficult time, even though you
could show that bricklayers, electricians were graduating at
18, 19 years old from our technical schools, making $60,000 a
year in this area, and we had to close the programs down
because many parents don't recognize that as a viable career.
We have to do the same thing. I know that it is a problem.
I think a challenge for all of us is to make people understand
that 95 percent of the Nation's trade and cargo comes by water,
is transported by water, and that this is--especially with the
growth in trade, as Mr. Coble and Mr. Gilchrest mentioned, it
is going to continue to grow. We are going to become more
dependent on our maritime highways and this is a career path
that has unlimited potential.
Mr. Cummings. Mr. Connaughton, you didn't answer my
question. Let me restate it. I want you to tell me that by the
end of your tenure you have certain objectives with regard to
our high schools. Do you or don't you? You can just say that,
yes or no, and then I can go a little further. In other words,
we have a limited time to act, and you have been blessed to be
placed in this position. I am glad to know you have local
government experience. What I am trying to get to is I would
like for you, if you agree with me, to make that one of your
top priorities, to try to establish more of these high schools.
And I agree, with the content, they have got to be,
content-wise, what we need. The school in Baltimore, to be
frank with you, when they created the school, they did not give
it the content that they needed, and that is what we are doing
now. But these young people are eager. They are so excited
about this school, and it is in the inner city of Baltimore
and, basically, we anticipate that, in a year, people will be
knocking down the doors trying to get into this school. And I
believe there are a lot of youngsters all over our Country
that, if they only knew--and if the parents; we have got to
educate parents, you are absolutely right. But I am asking you
are you committed to trying to do that under your watch.
Mr. Connaughton. Mr. Chairman, very much so within the
constraints of the resources I have.
Mr. Cummings. I understand.
Mr. Connaughton.. I have entirely five people dedicated to
all the manpower issues across this industry and we have one
person that I have essentially focused on these high school
programs, and the goal there is to develop a model curriculum
that we can then share with school districts, starting with
yours, but then sharing with school districts around the
Country. But the thing is that, again, that is a priority, but
within the fact that we are a very small agency and obviously
we have had many funding issues in the past and we are down to
just the four or five people that I have now pulled in and
created this office to deal with these types of issues.
Mr. Cummings. Well, we want to see if we can't perhaps help
you get more funding, perhaps in the future, so that you can
carry that out.
Last, but not least, let me ask you this. Does the Maritime
Administration have an advertising budget? If our goal is to
reach out to non-coastal areas, in addition to reaching areas
that are on the water, is it possible for MARAD to develop an
advertising campaign to make people aware of the maritime
industry and let them know that they are needed?
Mr. Connaughton. We have no funds, sir, none at all.
Mr. Cummings. So we have got this great need, but we have
no way of letting people know.
Mr. Connaughton. I think I have two or three people in my
public affairs shop and, for the most part, they are reporting
things that are happening in the press versus being out there.
Mr. Cummings. Well, we want to work with you on that.
I see my time is up.
Mr. LaTourette?
Mr. LaTourette. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Admiral, in your oral statement, and I think in your
written statement, you indicated that the Coast Guard is
cognizant of the fact that some of the new training
requirements under STCW and maybe TWIC, as well, are causing an
additional financial burden on mariners. I made a note; I
thought you said that the Coast Guard is examining that. Can
you sort of describe the examination and then tell me whether
or not the Federal Government, to your knowledge, has ever
participated in providing funds to mariners for these
additional training requirements and if you are authorized to
do so?
Admiral Whitehead. Yes, sir. We are very aware that the
cost to mariners associated with the STCW Convention
requirements are costly, particularly for those that are at the
more senior levels, the Masters, the Chief Engineers. Those
costs can be very much, they can exceed $20,000 for a full
round of STCW training requirements. So we are aware that it is
very costly.
We are looking into and working with a variety of industry
training schools into ways that we can bring training in
approved training courses through different means that would be
much less costly, perhaps. For example, we are looking into
computer-assisted training, long-distance training, things that
actually, in the United States Coast Guard, we are beginning to
use for our own personnel. We are trying to involve those
training entities out there to begin to use those sorts of
things.
The Coast Guard, to my knowledge, does not have any funding
directly associated with that, though there was a history of,
at one period, of some grants that I believe were provided to
MARAD at one point for training, but at this point we don't
have funds for that.
Mr. LaTourette. Two points on that. I understand you don't
have the funds. Do you think, if you had the funds, you would
be authorized to make that funding available?
Admiral Whitehead. I am not aware, sir, that we have a
legislative authority for using such funds. We certainly get
involved in many issues, particularly at the local sector
level, where there are industry days, for example, and we will
send Coast Guard personnel out to industry days and to assist.
We recently did one in Greenville, Mississippi that was
recently sponsored, which was very beneficial; MARAD was there
as well, I believe. And I think this is opening up, in many
ways, to people in the heartland of the Country and inner
cities, if it can be done right, the availability and the real
jobs that are out there.
Mr. LaTourette. Maybe that is something, Mr. Chairman, we
can look at as we move forward with our authorization.
Administrator Connaughton, you mentioned the LNG trade, and
we have had a number of hearings on LNGs. Specifically to the
Merchant Marine Academy and the six State marine academies, is
there additional capacity at those facilities to accommodate
more cadets?
Mr. Connaughton. It is restricted, sir, it is limited.
Basically, with the State maritime academies, the capacity is
really limited by the school ships. The school ships that we
provide have a certain number of berthing. The sea days that
they obtain on those cruises are essential to getting the sea
service necessary to get their licenses. The Merchant Marine
Academy has essentially been capped at a certain amount. Right
now, we have around 1,000 students. We graduate a little over
200 every year. So there are some self-limiting issues. We have
tried to, especially now, we are trying to open up more cadet
berths that will allow at least the State schools to
potentially increase enrollment. But, for the most part, I
think Admiral Craine will be testifying later on and I think he
will verify this, that it is the school ships, it is the size,
the age, and the ability of the school ships to handle certain
capacity. That is one of the biggest limiting factors.
Mr. LaTourette. Last question. The Chairman had a hearing a
little earlier on the TWIC card, the transportation worker
identification card. We had Homeland Security here and a number
of Members of the Subcommittee expressed some disappointment
with the progress of that. But in reviewing the testimony of
the witnesses that will appear after you, there is an assertion
by some that the requirement to have a TWIC card is perceived
in the maritime industry, in some sectors, to be a deterrent
from folks entering the industry.
Admiral, I invite your comments on that observation that we
will hear later.
Admiral Whitehead. Sir, I don't go to any maritime event
anywhere in the Eighth Coast Guard District where I don't hear
about the TWIC cards, as I am sure you do here as well. I have
heard, anecdotally, that this is a deterrent or somewhat of a
barrier; it is another cost that is associated with it. I was
very heartened to learn, in a recent briefing that I had, that
the initial costs that were estimated for a TWIC card have gone
down substantially, down to, I think, $139. So I am very
heartened with that respect.
I don't have any firm data to say that that is a factor,
but, to be very honest, sir,--we were discussing this earlier--
if I were a merchant mariner, I would be the first one on the
block to have a TWIC card, because if I have that TWIC card,
you are very much more marketable in your own industry and in
other industries because you have got that credential that
allows you entry from a security perspective. So I know this is
a little bit of a difficult issue, but just yesterday, I
believe, in Delaware, we had an enrollment session there. There
were 25 new credentials that were issued, but there were 1,000
mariners that were pre-enrolled to get their TWIC card, and I
thought that was a pretty substantial roll-out of that system.
Mr. LaTourette. I thank you for that answering. I know that
when we had the hearing, I could never figure out why it is
$139. That seems like a strange number to me, but thank you.
And thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Cummings. Thank you very much, Mr. LaTourette.
Mr. Bishop.
Mr. Bishop. Thank you, Mr .Chairman. I know this issue of
shortage of qualified mariners has many dimensions to it, but I
would like to focus on the LNG piece of it.
Mr. Connaughton, your testimony indicates that the fact
that we have few, if any, U.S. flagged LNG vessels--and I know
you have been successful in developing a few--that U.S.
mariners are at a strategic disadvantage in a market that is
going to explode--perhaps I should rephrase that.
[Laughter.]
Mr. Bishop.--in a market that is going to expand
dramatically over the next couple of years, leading potentially
to safety risks, potentially to security risks. As I say, I
know that you have done some work; you have been successful in
bringing some U.S. flagged vessels into this market. What else
can be done? What other tools perhaps can Congress give the
Maritime Administration to help develop both U.S. flagged
vessels and U.S. mariners in this industry?
Mr. Connaughton. Mr. Bishop, I think the law today allows
us to pursue voluntary agreements, and I think we have been
successful in doing so. One of the things, obviously, is that
we only deal with the offshore facilities; we do not deal with
onshore or those within the territorial waters. So it is kind
of limited in scope as to the vessels or the applications that
we can raise and broach this issue.
One of the things that we have also been working on and we
are able to get the State maritime academies, the Merchant
Marine Academy, and all the labor organization operated
training schools to come together on a uniform standard of
training, the same types of what we like to say is a model
curriculum and career path training path that we will get
everyone to come together on. It is actually implementing that
now is what we are trying to focus on, as obviously there is a
resource issue with that. And it is by making sure we have that
type of pipeline.
But I think we have been doing what we have been able to
do, given the current structure of the law, given the current
structure of at least the resources that we have available.
I will mention one thing. We have been made aware that one
of the things that is an issue is how we treat the income taxes
of American mariners versus how mariners from other countries
are dealt with by their own home countries that actually places
our American mariners at a little bit of a disadvantage when
you are looking at the general marketplace, and that is
something we are trying to get a better handle on as well.
Mr. Bishop. I know this question may go beyond somewhat the
scope of this hearing, but for both Admiral Whitehead and Mr.
Connaughton, is the fact that we have a bifurcated approval
process for LNG facilities--some of them are under the
jurisdiction of the FERC, others would be under the
jurisdiction of the Coast Guard and the Maritime
Administration--does that complicate this issue? I mean, is the
FERC sufficiently sensitive to this issue of the qualifications
of the mariners that will be serving on the vessels that will
be re-gasifying these facilities? Is that something? And, as I
say, I will put this question to both the Admiral and to you,
Mr. Connaughton. I mean, is our process the right process?
Should we not have one entity that is responsible for reviewing
these applications, as opposed to two, given the fact that we
have some concern about the qualifications of the mariners on
these vessels?
Mr. Connaughton. I will maybe answer this from this
perspective. The Coast Guard is involved in both sets of
applications, particularly on the environmental side. We work
very, very closely with the Coast Guard on our aspect of
licensing and we are the actual licensing authority for the
deepwater ports. Because of the law that you all have passed,
we require and have issues that FERC does not deal with, does
not raise, and one issue is financial responsibility. We
require some fairly substantial financial responsibility.
Because of our law, we require there to be provisions on how
you will dismantle facilities after you are done.
But also, due to the law, we raise the issue of American
flags; we raise the issue of American mariners. That is not
part of FERC's law, so it doesn't get raised, as far as we are
aware, in their approval process. So it does make it so there
obviously is a bifurcated system. The only thing I will mention
to you is that we are seeing more and more interest in offshore
facilities due to some of the concerns and questions being
raised by onshore facilities, but right now there is a
different system and theirs is just, in many ways--well, they
don't raise the same issue we do.
Mr. Bishop. Thank you.
Admiral Whitehead?
Admiral Whitehead. Yes, sir. I am glad you raised this
issue, sir. First, I don't believe that the bifurcated process
that we have got right now is really a problem. I mean, at
first, I think, ramping up, there were some issues there, at
least in the Eighth Coast Guard District, in the Gulf of
Mexico, where we have 8 to 15, depending on how you count, LNG
facilities in development. This is now going a little bit more
smoother.
The whole issue of LNG permits is really almost equally
owned, I think, between as an energy requirement, as a
transportation security requirement. So it brings in both the
Energy Department, FERC, and the Coast Guard into it.
I should also say I don't believe FERC is really involved
in the issue of the qualification of the mariners, and that
would be more an issue for the Coast Guard, at least from an
international perspective; and I am very, very concerned about
that. In the Gulf of Mexico, as I mentioned--and, Mr. Chairman,
we have discussed this before--right now we have about 261
annual arrivals of LNG ships into the Gulf of Mexico annually,
compared to 210 everywhere else in the United States. In fiscal
year 2008, we are going to go from 261 to about 780 arrivals,
and in the next four or five years after that to over 6,000 to
7,000 arrivals a year. So the whole thought of the LNG, the
growth of LNG, as you mentioned before, is very, very much in
my concern.
We are working with Maritime Administration to lay out the
training standards that would be required for LNG workers under
the STCW Convention, as well. So I am very, very concerned
about the capacity, though, and you raised that as well. With
all these new ships coming into the United States, it will
require not only training for mariners, it will also require
additional training for Coast Guard inspectors, who have to be
very, very technically astute and trained with these brand new
ships, $250 million vessels that are being constructed just for
this trade.
Mr. Cummings. Thank you very much.
Mr. Coble.
Mr. Coble. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Gentlemen, good to have you all with us. The current
shortage of merchant mariners available to work aboard U.S.
flagged vessels, do you classify that as a moderate problem or
a critical problem?
Admiral Whitehead. Sir, we don't really tally up those
numbers, but I can tell you I don't go to an event, either in
the United States, whether it is in the inland waters, whether
it is a coastal maritime group, or if it is an offshore group,
where they are not talking about the shortage of mariners and
getting mariners in there. I think there is a real problem, but
part of that is based upon how busy the business is. All areas
of the maritime industry in the United States are tremendously
busy.
I was astounded to learn, in the Eighth District, that
between 2001 and 2007 our number of inspectors for marine
inspectors had doubled, from 18,000 inspections a year to
36,000 inspections a year. Now, the year 2001 has nothing to do
with 9/11. This is not security inspection, these are safety
inspections; and they have doubled in five years, and that is
because of the economy and because this business is so
important to our economy. So it is a real concern to me and I
hear about this all the time, but I don't really have the
numbers to tell you.
I can also tell you that, internationally, I was recently
overseas and met with five or six different shipowners, and I
can tell you that they are facing the same exact issues, same
problems. It is a worldwide demographic issue.
Mr. Coble. Thank you, Admiral.
Mr. Connaughton, do you concur with that?
Mr. Connaughton. Mr. Coble, again, we only have anecdotal
information, until we get this survey out and actually put some
numbers to it. We know this is a major, major challenge and
concern. I think we are just facing a perfect storm. When you
look at the increased demand for waterborne transportation, the
fact that we are seeing retirements, we are seeing a lot of
people go ashore because right now, especially marine
engineers, any type of technical background, are really getting
great job offers ashore. And then what is happening worldwide,
if you look at the numbers worldwide, I will tell you right now
if our numbers mirror those, we are facing a critical shortage,
because the numbers worldwide are showing tens of thousands.
When they do their projections, they are showing tens of
thousands of licensed officers.
Mr. Coble. And I think the shortages inevitably negatively
impact the viability of the U.S. fleet, (a), and negatively
impact the national security posture of our Country as well.
Back to the statement I made earlier, gentlemen. Does the
Federal Government have a responsibility to provide training or
to ensure the availability of training for mariners working in
the private sector?
Mr. Connaughton. Mr. Coble, it has been a cornerstone of
American maritime policy since 1936 that the Federal Government
has a vested role, due to safety and security, national defense
reasons, to have trained mariners, particularly those mariners
who can be called upon during times of national emergency,
which even since the 70 years since that Act was passed, we
have proven time in and time out the American merchant marine
and its mariners are critical to not just the economic needs of
this Nation, but also its national defense, and they have
always been there whenever this Nation has called.
Mr. Coble. And are you currently authorized to make such
funding available?
Mr. Connaughton. Sir, yes. Well, our programs today, our
principal programs, between the Merchant Marine Academy and the
six State maritime schools, are really geared towards the deep
sea mariner and what has been traditionally viewed as the most
essential for the national security and economic interests. I
think what we are seeing now is that many of the State schools,
even our GMAT school, as well as employer-run and labor
organization-run schools, are starting to deal with some of
these other issues that are being faced. But, for the most
part, our programs really have been geared toward the deep sea
mariner, and we are now trying to make them available to the
brown-water inland types of fleets.
Mr. Coble. I thank you.
Admiral, do you want to add anything to that?
Admiral Whitehead. No, sir, I don't really have anything to
add.
Mr. Coble. Gentlemen, thank you for being with us.
I yield back, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Cummings. Thank you very much.
Mr. Taylor.
Mr. Taylor. I want to thank our witnesses for being here.
I am curious, Mr. Connaughton, with the problems that both
the Navy and the Coast Guard have experienced in acquisitions
and with the decision by Secretary Winter and I think also by
the Commandant of the Coast Guard to try to bring the
acquisition programs back in-house, as opposed to turning them
over to the private sector, has there been any discussion with
you, the Merchant Marine Academy or the other maritime
academies, of explaining this programs as far as design and
ramping up those acquisition programs to bring back what the
Navy refers to as a supervisor of shipbuilding? And if so, is
that complicating the problems that you have outlined in your
testimony or is that something that is just kind of on the edge
and only marginally adds to your challenges?
Mr. Connaughton. Mr. Taylor, we at the Merchant Marine
Academy and at the State schools, many of them have a sub-major
or a major that involves shipbuilding and shipyards. However,
for the most part, almost all the programs, at least that we
are involved with, are really geared towards making sure we
have merchant marine officers. We haven't attempted to address
that type of issue. We recognize very much that many of the
shipyards are facing some enormous challenges themselves in
finding people, but that is actually not in the acquisition
side, but really focused on the actual technical and detail
issues of the shipyards.
I just want to mention one thing to you, that I have become
very diligent in ensuring that we grant few, if not--well, I
limit the number of waivers that are available to graduates
from this year from the Merchant Marine Academy--I will be
looking at the State schools as well--regarding their
obligations and whether they can go ashore. Because of the
great job market and the fact that we need people onboard these
vessels of every size, I am pushing them to go to sea and
fulfill their obligation. The only exception to that is that I
have allowed a certain percentage to work in the shipyards
because of recognizing their issues and problems, and we can't
have these good challenges of recapitalization and more vessels
without the yards to produce them. So I have bene allowing some
graduates to actually go into the shipyards, but we have not
been focused on the acquisition side, sir.
Mr. Taylor. Just as a matter of curiosity--and maybe,
Admiral, this would be better directed at you--I was looking at
the--and I happen to have been a Member of Congress in the wake
of the tragic accident outside of Mobile that led to
Congressman Tauzin and others substantially increasing the
training for mariners and the hurdles for mariners. I am
curious, when you talk about the costs of acquiring those
additional licenses and those additional courses, are the
people who take these courses, are they eligible for the
Montgomery GI bill if they are veterans? Is that something that
the Montgomery GI bill would pay for, as if they were going to
a community college or normal university?
Admiral Whitehead. Sir, I am not at all an expert on that,
but I would believe it is. I think we need to get back to you
with an answer on that.
Mr. Taylor. Would you, please?
[Information follows:]
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] 38515.012
Admiral Whitehead. But I think that is something that
sounds to me like it would clearly fit into the GI bill.
Mr. Taylor. Okay.
Admiral Whitehead. We will get back to you on that, sir.
Mr. Taylor. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Cummings. Thank you.
Mr. Gilchrest.
Mr. Gilchrest. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Just a quick comment on high schools. I think, Mr.
Connaughton, you said that you might focus on Mr. Cummings'
high schools for high school maritime. If you could come over
to the eastern shore of Maryland, maybe we could double up on
that.
In the course of my district work, we have college seminars
for students twice a year, and we always make sure that we have
a representative from the Merchant Marine Academy at those
seminars. I think what we ought to do in addition to that--
maybe, Elijah, you and I can work on this--is have school
officials in one of those seminars to show what opportunities
there are out there in the maritime industry, something that we
don't really place a lot of emphasis on. But there is, I think,
a valuable reason for doing that because there are many
students, I just know, that this doesn't fall within their
frame of reference. If they had the opportunity, they were
exposed to it, they would take advantage of it, which leads to
the next question.
If we can't now expand, for example, the Merchant Marine
Academy that we have or the six other State academies that we
have, and we want more high schools to expose students to this
type of opportunity, that means we really need to find a way to
start expanding those college facilities so that they can take
advantage of these opportunities.
I guess, Mr. Connaughton, how many graduates from the
Merchant Marine Academy do you know stay in a career in the
maritime industry? Is there a percentage we could look at?
Mr. Connaughton. We can give you some of those numbers,
sir. I don't have them with me. I can tell you, again, from my
anecdotal information, that the vast majority do stay in.
Mr. Gilchrest. I see.
Mr. Connaughton. They may go ashore and assume management
positions, but, for the most part, I think that almost all stay
in some sort of maritime-related field.
Mr. Gilchrest. The other thing, it is my understanding--
although I don't know this, I am not on the Armed Services
Committee; maybe Gene Taylor can tell me--if you are a graduate
of West Point or the Naval Academy or the Air Force Academy, it
is my understanding that the military will send you to graduate
school or post-graduate school. You can get a PhD while you are
in the military. When you graduate the Merchant Marine Academy
and you want to get a further degree, a Master's or a PhD, does
the maritime industry, in some capacity, pay for that degree?
Mr. Connaughton. Well, it is not necessarily the advanced
degree, sir, as much as it is maybe the advanced license. I
think what the normal career path would be, starting out as a
Third Mate or Third Assistant, then moving up to Second, First,
and then Master or a Chief Engineer. I think the challenge that
everyone is facing today is that it has become very, very
difficult for mariners to work their way up the what we used to
call hawsepipe, license-to-license. And also for those mariners
who are sailing, if they are not a member of a labor
organization with a training school or they do not have an
employer to pay for these courses that are required due to
regulatory----
Mr. Gilchrest. So if you are a graduate of the maritime
industry or one of these State schools, to move up the ladder,
for example, is vastly different than it would be to move up
the ladder in the Coast Guard or the Navy.
Mr. Connaughton. Yes, sir, that is correct.
Mr. Gilchrest. This isn't the same sort of structure. Is
there any way we could take a look at that structure and begin
the process of examining it to change it?
Mr. Connaughton. Well, you know, it is one of these issues,
sir, where there are regulatory standards that deal with the
licensing and then there are the educational standards. And
every one of these graduates from Kings Point and those who
have the obligation from the State schools, they end up having
their commission in the military, in the Reserve; they have
their degree and they have their license; and if you sort of
look at them, all three have different sorts of career paths
and different sorts of requirements.
Mr. Gilchrest. If you look at the number of graduates in
the maritime industry today, the State schools or Merchant
Marine Academy, how short are they of meeting demand?
Mr. Connaughton. It is difficult to actually put a number
on it. I can tell you that my conversations with particularly
the State presidents, that they have never seen applications
like they have seen today, the numbers of people trying to get
into their, in particular, licensed programs. And when you
look, anecdotally, at the number of employers coming to the
career days, trying to attract soon to be new graduates, they
are seeing record numbers of companies coming and seeking
graduates, and many graduates having multiple job offers. I
mean, again, we are going to try to get a handle on some of the
real numbers, but we have never seen a job market this good, or
at least have not seen a job market this good in a very long
time.
Mr. Gilchrest. That is great. Thank you very much.
Mr. Taylor. Mr. Gilchrest, would you yield for one minute?
Mr. Gilchrest. I think I have five minutes left.
Do I have five minutes left, Elijah?
Mr. Cummings. Yes.
Mr. Taylor. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Thank you, Mr. Gilchrest.
Secretary, I am just curious. Is anyone tracking--I am sort
of familiar with the offshore supply vessel business and the
boom and bust with it, so I am curious, is anyone tracking the
boom in the offshore supply vessel business to what extent that
is affecting the shortages that are going on right now; and,
again, it has been very cyclical. If there is a bust, there is
the boom in hiring for the young people coming out of the
Merchant Marine Academy, coming out of S.U.N.Y. Does that
continue or do we get back to a situation where we were a few
years ago, where we are looking for places for these young
people to serve?
Mr. Connaughton. Sir, I think, at $88 a barrel for oil, the
boom is here. They are going further and further out in the
exploration for oil. What we are seeing--again, it is anecdotal
conversations with OMSA, the offshore industry, as well as
actual individual operators that they are having a very
difficult time finding people. They are offering incredible
salaries, and as long as oil stays at the price it is, which,
given the growth in the economies in China and India, as well
as the rest of the Far East, we think the boom times are going
to be here for quite some time, sir. And the salaries and the
size of the vessels and the complexity of the vessels that are
in the offshore industry is like something we have never seen
before; they really are ships. And for the foreseeable future,
as long as those economies worldwide continue to grow, we think
the boom time for the offshore industry is going to be there
and stay here.
Mr. Taylor. But does that contribute 20 percent of the
demand, is it 10 percent of the demand, is it half the demand?
That is what I am trying to get in my mind.
Mr. Connaughton. I don't know, sir. I actually have
numbers, aggregate numbers for employment. Again, when I said
it was about 85 percent right now, just a few months after
graduation at sea or in the military, we can go back and try to
break those numbers down and see actually where people are
working.
Given that, actually, right now, in the United States, on
the deepwater side, we do have a sufficient number of mariners,
I think when we go back and break these numbers down and get
them back to you, we are going to see that the vast majority of
the demand for these graduates is offshore as well as inland.
Mr. Cummings. Mr. Larsen.
Mr. Taylor. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Larsen. I am waiting for that clock to reset to get my
five minutes. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Admiral Whitehead, something specific to Washington State.
We are obviously looking at, on the Committee, lifestyle
issues, wage levels, requirements, and so on. I know that the
Coast Guard is working with the State ferry system to implement
some regulations on crew endurance and fatigue, and these
regulations, specifically the requirement that a mariner work
no more than 12 hours in a 24 hour period, don't always work
with our State ferry schedule, which is not a tourist
attraction, but State ferries are an important part of our
commerce and transportation system.
I just wanted to get your impression. Is the Coast Guard
able to be flexible enough with the regulations as they apply
to different sectors of the maritime industry? Because this
particular sector of the maritime industry is in fact
particular largely to Washington State, the largest vehicle
traffic on ferries, the largest passenger traffic on ferries of
any ferry system in the Country.
Admiral Whitehead. Yes, sir. I am generally familiar with
your ferry system. I know it is a very large one and it plays a
great role in your economy and, of course, in transportation.
The crew endurance system, I am glad our people are working the
your State officials on that as well, because it is a very
important issue for us.
Right now, the laws, as I understand them, read basically
that a mariner can't operate more than 12 hours continuously,
except in an emergency situation. So I am not sure that we have
the flexibility to make any changes in that right now, but I am
quite sure the State ferry system is engaging with our maritime
licensing people within the Thirteenth Coast Guard District.
Mr. Larsen. I am sure they are. I know that they are, and I
just hope that there is enough flexibility found to continue to
make our ferry system work. It is not easy. Sometimes you just
can't take an 8 foot skiff from San Juan Island to Anacortes to
get back home after your shift is done, and that is a
scheduling problem, obviously, but sometimes that is the way it
works when you have the ferry system you have.
Admiral Whitehead. Yes, sir. I should also say that if they
are on a two-watch schedule, which I believe they are there,
there is flexibility within the company itself or the State to
adjust those hours in some way. Many companies--and I am not
sure about your ferry system--are operating on a square six
system, where they are doing six hours off and six hours on,
and there is some flexibility there, providing they don't
exceed the 12 hours.
Mr. Larsen. Okay. I just wanted to highlight that.
The second is for you as well. In your testimony, you talk
about future improvements that will benefit merchant mariners,
and the four bullet points read more like a list of goals as
opposed to specifics, so I was wondering if you could walk
through a couple of specifics. One is expediting the regulatory
implementation for training and recruitment, and second is
improving the mariner credentialing through greater efficiency,
transparency, and capacity, and continuing to improve
processes. It sounds a little more goal-oriented than specific
actions. If you can walk through the actions for us.
Admiral Whitehead. Yes, sir. I have to tell you I came to
the Eighth Coast Guard District about a year ago. I was very
dismayed at the delays that we were seeing at our regional
examination centers in New Orleans and Houston. We took some
immediate actions for improvement and now--and I have to tell
you I was a bit skeptical with the future implementation or
standing up of the National Maritime Center. My offices have
been working very closely with the NMC to see exactly what they
are doing, and I had an opportunity about a month ago to come
up and visit the in West Virginia. And I have to tell you I
will certainly not tell you today that we have turned the
corner on licensing and credentials, some of the delays that we
have had, but I think the corner is in sight. I am very, very
heartened by the improvements that we are making and that the
NMC is making. There is a variety of things that we are trying
to do at the NMC and the numbers are actually showing up as
improvements. So there is activity that is showing some real
improvements.
But what we are trying to do at the National Maritime
Center is, first off, to decrease the processing time that is
involved in getting a mariner his credential, whether it is a
license or a merchant mariner's document, from the time he
submits it. Before, we had 17 regional examination centers that
probably each had their own process for how they would handle a
license or an MMD application. Now we will be going to a system
where we have just one location and one process to manage. So I
thin that will give us some clear improvements there.
We are trying to also improve consistency of service by
having centralized evaluators in one place. That will, I think,
also help us.
And then, finally, we are improving things with customer
service, which was an area that was sorely in need of some
improvement. We have established a new toll-free call center,
where a mariner can call up this 888 number toll free, they can
get an application sent to them. Once their application is
submitted, they can actually monitor the progress of their
license online, and they can track it and see it, and they can
talk to a human being and find out exactly where their license
application is in the system.
And I mentioned to you that we are getting results. Just in
the period of time since the NMC has stood up, a matter of
months, they have reduced the inventory of applications that
were awaiting processing by 39 percent. In addition, the
average license renewal has decreased by about 25 percent in
the time it takes to get out since June.
I have to tell you that one of the other major things that
is an improvement, I think, in the Eighth Coast Guard District,
particularly at New Orleans, but also Memphis and Houston, one
of the problems we had was our applications were coming in at a
rate of about 60 percent to 80 percent errors. So the
applications were not complete when they were turned in. This
put a little bit of a hardship on the mariner in the sense that
he or she might be going to sea, and they would mail in their
application and there was maybe a block that needed to be
filled in or some document that wasn't here, and then they are
gone for maybe several months, potentially, and then they come
back and get the thing, then they mail it off again; and it was
this back and forth. So it was a real problem.
We are now going to assist them where, in the Eighth
District, we have created a CD wizard application, so you can
plug the CD in, and if you forget to fill in something, it will
highlight it in red, just as you would see if you ordered
something on line and you forgot to put your telephone number
in it. So we are going to that and the NMC is now seeking
additional funding to be able to improve their licensing
documentation computer system to give them greater flexibility
and speed up their process time as well.
So I think we are really seeing some very, very important
changes, and with that comes additional people, additional
people that have not been there in the past that will be able
to, I think, handle the capacity much better. I am very
optimistic.
Mr. Larsen. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Cummings. Thank you very much.
I ask unanimous consent that Mr. Boustany may sit with the
Subcommittee and participate in this hearing. Without
objection, so ordered.
Mr. Boustany, do you have questions?
Mr. Boustany. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Having just come in,
I don't have any specific questions at this time. I just want
to say that workforce issues in the maritime industry, in my
home State of Louisiana, we have reached a crisis stage. I
represent coastal Louisiana, two of the parishes in coastal
Louisiana. I have visited a number of our facilities, and this
is something that is urgent. It is a complex problem and I
hopeful that we can start looking toward solutions as we go
forward.
I want to thank the Subcommittee Chairman for holding this
hearing and for allowing me to sit in.
Mr. Cummings. Thank you very much.
Ms. Richardson.
Ms. Richardson. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Just three quick
questions.
In the information provided, you talk about a list of
individual companies that provided partnership programs. Could
you please provide this Committee the contact information and
the location of those individual companies?
Mr. Connaughton. Yes, ma'am, we will provide those to you.
Ms. Richardson. My second question is it also is noted in
the information that the Seafarers International Union in
Maryland has a pretty extensive apprenticeship program. Could
you also provide to this Committee for the other locations
where the Seafarers are located? For example, for me in
California, do they have a similar program? And, if not, what
we could do to make that happen?
And, number three, you also noted in the information that
there are 250 training providers. If we could also receive that
information of contacts and locations.
Mr. Connaughton. Sure, ma'am. We will get you all of those.
Ms. Richardson. Thank you very much.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Cummings. Thank you very much, Ms. Richardson.
Let me just ask. I want to go back to you, Admiral
Whitehead. In the next panel there is going to be some
discussion by Mr. Michael Rodriguez, Assistant to the President
of Masters, Mates, and Pilots Union, about the way mariners are
treated, and, as you know, the conduct of the Coast Guard's ALJ
system has been, and continues to be, of great concern to the
entire Subcommittee. One witness write in testimony that the
Coast Guard is unwilling to fully inform mariners of the nature
of an investigation and their rights during an investigation.
Also, the testimony suggests that the information given by the
mariner in an accident investigation could be used to prosecute
the mariner. Is this common practice? The Coast Guard has been
required to cite the Miranda rights to a mariner when their
statements may be used against them.
And so that you understand the relevance, in Mr.
Rodriguez's testimony, what he is saying is that because of the
way mariners are treated, it is his belief that that may deter
them from wanting to become mariners. In other words, they
don't want to suddenly become criminals when they are trying to
pursue their life pursuits, and they feel, quite often, that
they have been treated unfairly.
Now, this doesn't just come from Mr. Rodriguez. As you
know, we have had an extensive hearing on ALJ and there has
been no subject that this Subcommittee has addressed that has
drawn more interest than the fairness of hearings and the ALJ
process. So would you comment on that for me, please?
Admiral Whitehead. Yes, sir. As I understand it, there are
about 5,600 cases a year that are brought from the Coast Guard
that could potentially result in an administrative hearing, and
of those, most of those are handled, let's say, in-house by the
Coast Guard, so that there are only around 1,100 that even make
its way up to the ALJs. And then, at that point, most are
handled in some way that don't result actually in a hearing, so
that there are only a couple hundred hearings a year.
With respect to the potential prosecutions, there are some
laws that are old on the books and some newer ones that
certainly require the prosecution of mariners if there is a
criminal violation, and cases that come to my mind are cases
involving environmental crimes. Should a case like that come
up, I am quite sure that the Coast Guard ourselves would not
prosecute an individual criminally; that would go to the local
U.S. attorney, and at that point we would turn it over to the
U.S. attorney. And whether the U.S. attorney could handle those
types of cases, it is a selective sort of thing based on their
workload, I believe.
Mr. Cummings. But you didn't address my question. And I
realize that you may not have been prepared for that, but I
would really like for you to look into that issue, and I will
put it in writing, the issue of Miranda rights and a lot of
times mariners feeling that they have been placed in a position
where they are damned if they do and damned if they don't, and
they think they are trying to work out issues and it is like a
``gotcha'' kind of situation, as opposed to a situation where
there is some leeway, where it could be worked out; the next
thing you know, they are hauled before an ALJ hearing and have
not been even given the Miranda rights.
As you know, we are looking seriously and, by the way, in a
bipartisan way, in removing the ALJ from under the Coast Guard.
We are just looking at trying to figure out the best way to do
it. But, in the meantime, we just want to make sure that
mariners are treated fairly and that we are not causing folks
not to come into this profession because of the belief that
they might be treated that way.
Admiral Whitehead. Yes, sir. I would be glad to get back to
you on the record with that, sir, but I should say that unless
things have changed, I used to be an investigator myself, many
years ago, and if there were some belief that there was a
criminal violation involved, I am quite sure our Coast Guard
investigator would give the appropriate warnings.
Mr. Cummings. All right. And the other thing that we will
do is we are going to make sure that you get a copy of the
relevant testimony so that you can--sometimes I think we sort
of talk passed each other--so that you will know what the
people who are subject to the Coast Guard are feeling and
saying. Okay?
Admiral Whitehead. I would be happy to do that, sir.
Mr. Cummings. Thank you very much, both of you. We really
appreciate it. Thank you.
If our next panel would come forth now, please.
Mr. Michael Rodriguez is the Assistant to the President of
the Masters, Mates, and Pilots Union; Mr. Carl Annessa,
President for Operations, Hornbeck Offshore Services; Ms. Cathy
Hammond, Chief Executive Officer for Inland Marine Services
with the American Waterways Operators; Admiral John Craine, the
President of Maritime College of New York; Captain William
Beacom, Navigation Consultant and Professional Mariner; and Mr.
Augustin Tellez, Executive Vice President of Seafarers
International Union.
First of all, thank you all for being with us. It is my
understanding that we are going to have a vote in about 10
minutes. We have got six witnesses, so let's try to adhere, as
close we can, to the five minute rule. Thank you. And if you
want to take less, you are welcome.
[Laughter.]
TESTIMONY OF MICHAEL RODRIGUEZ, EXECUTIVE ASSISTANT TO THE
PRESIDENT, MASTERS, MATES AND PILOTS; CARL ANNESSA, COO/VICE
PRESIDENT FOR OPERATIONS, HORNBECK OFFSHORE SERVICES FOR
OFFSHORE MARINE SERVICE ASSOCIATION; CATHY HAMMOND, CEO, INLAND
MARINE SERVICE FOR AMERICAN WATERWAY OPERATORS; ADMIRAL JOHN
CRAINE, JR. USN, RETIRED, PRESIDENT, S.U.N.Y. MARITIME COLLEGE;
CAPTAIN WILLIAM BEACOM, NAVIGATION CONSULTANT, PROFESSIONAL
MARINER; AUGUSTIN TELLEZ, EXECUTIVE VICE PRESIDENT, SEAFARERS
INTERNATIONAL UNION
Mr. Rodriguez. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I will go through
this as quickly as possible, in the interest of time.
Good morning, Mr. Chairman and Members of the Subcommittee.
I am Michael Rodriguez, Executive Assistant to the President of
the International Organization of Masters, Mates, and Pilots. I
began my career in the maritime industry as a graduate of the
United States Merchant Marine Academy in 1979. I sailed as a
deck officer aboard U.S. flagged vessels until 1995. I am an
officer of the Naval Reserve and a veteran of Operation
Enduring Freedom. Thank you for inviting me to appear today.
America's mariners are an important national asset, an
asset that our Nation cannot afford to lose. Mariners have
served our armed forces; they are supporting our troops in the
Middle East. As Naval officers, mariners have performed on
active duty at sea, ashore, and as harbor pilots. American
mariners play a role in relief and humanitarian efforts.
Following the attack on the World Trade Center, mariners
rapidly mobilized to evacuate thousands from lower Manhattan.
In 2005, they helped provide relief to the victims of the Gulf
hurricanes and the tsunami.
A strong commercial fleet provides good paying jobs and is
an essential part of maintaining these capabilities and
attracting young people to our industry. To this purpose, there
are three fundamental elements of maritime policy that Congress
and the Administration must continue to support. First, the
Maritime Security Program is crucial toward maintaining a U.S.
flagged fleet and an American presence in world shipping
markets and opportunity for mariners; second, the Jones Act is
central to our economic security and an important source of
jobs; and, third, our cargo preference laws must be fully
enforced. They provide an important incentive for shipowners to
keep their ships under the American flag.
Mariners face many challenges: they endure long separations
from home, extreme working environments, and the dangers of the
sea. They have always accepted these difficulties, but there
are aspects of their work that governments and industry can
manage.
Criminalization of the unintentional acts of mariners
following accidents is a human rights issue as well as a
recruiting and retention issue. The maritime community
recognizes that mariners, subject to the laws of many
jurisdictions, must have special legal protections under
uniform international standards. Regrettably, the United States
opposes the international community's work on this issue.
Mariners live where they work. They often sleep only a few
feet away from engine rooms, cargo spaces, and machinery.
Quality rest is essential for a safe workplace, stress relief,
and overall health. A recent survey reported that one in four
mariners said they had fallen asleep on watch. Nearly 50
percent of mariners reported work weeks of 85 hours or longer.
Almost 50 percent of mariners believe their working hours are a
danger to their personal safety. In the short term, stress and
fatigue cause accidents. In the long-term, the effects are poor
health and reduced life expectancy.
Maritime security regulations have not only increased the
workload on our mariners, they have cut off mariners' ties with
the shore. Unfortunately, in many ports around the United
States, mariners, labor representatives, visitors, and welfare
service providers are denied access under the pretense of
maritime security. The right to shore leave is a part of the
International Ship and Port Facility Code, which is a treaty
obligation of the United States. However, this important human
right is often ignored.
The Members of this Subcommittee are well aware of the
problems with the TWIC program. There are two issues that most
directly affect the maritime workforce. First, the program goes
well beyond what Congress originally intended and it
unnecessarily burdens mariners. For instance, mariners or
prospective mariners who have committed one of the
disqualifying crimes will be denied a TWIC until they prove
that they are not a terrorism threat. Many of these individuals
will leave the industry rather than endure this bureaucratic
exercise. Second, a TWIC will not guarantee access for mariners
to shore leave because the TWIC, a Federal security program,
does not preempt State, local, or facility access control
measures.
Mr. Chairman, the United States must stop treating mariners
like criminals and begin to treat them like the national asset
that they are. They are dedicated professionals performing
services essential to our Nation's economic and national
security. If we can manage and develop this national asset
appropriately, we have a chance to compete for the best and
brightest of our young people.
This concludes my remarks, Mr. Chairman. I would be happy
to answer your questions.
Mr. Cummings. Mr. Annessa?
Mr. Annessa. Thank you for allowing me to testify on this
subject this morning. My name is Carl Annessa. I am the
Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer of
Hornbeck Offshore Services, a publicly traded company which
owns and operates vessels that support the offshore and the gas
industry. Today, I am testifying on behalf of the Offshore
Marine Service Association. OMSA's member companies are the
lifeline to America's offshore energy resources, providing the
U.S. flagged vessels that move all of the equipment and most of
the workers needed to find and produce our Nation's offshore
oil and gas resources.
The topic of this hearing is important and timely: the
offshore work boat sectors and the process of replacing and
upgrading our fleet, building an estimated 150 offshore service
vessels over the next five years. A recent OMSA survey
indicates that our members will need about 3600 mariners to
crew these new state-of-the-art vessels. Given the time that it
takes for a mariner to work his or her way up to becoming a
licensed captain or a licensed engineer, building our workforce
is as important an industry priority as is building our new
vessels.
Our industry is concerned about the licensing process. The
burdens that the International Standards for Training,
Certification, and Watchkeeping Code have placed on our
mariners are challenging. The STCW, which sets worldwide
standards for mariners, was developed for large ships on ocean
voyages. However, more than 90 percent of the U.S. flagged
vessels that fall under the requirements of the STCW are
smaller coastal and offshore boats. Increasingly, the Coast
Guard's interpretation of STCW's mandates are out of synch with
the needs of the vast majority of American mariners who fall
under STCW.
The Coast Guard does deserve credit, however, for its
efforts to revamp its licensing and documentation system, and
to cut down somewhat on the delays wrought by the
implementation of STCW. From every indication, and some of
those that you heard a minute ago from Admiral Whitehead, those
reforms are beginning to take hold and beginning to improve the
results of the licensing process that our employees face.
However, the licensing process was developed for another age,
when mariners had different and less complex needs. The current
reforms may only improve the efficiency of an antiquated
system. The Coast Guard needs to continue to strive for the
modernization of the entire process to meet the needs of
mariners today. If that takes additional resources, we would
certainly encourage Congress to fund it.
Another challenge that we face, again, as you have heard,
is the aging of our workforce. A recent OMSA survey of member
companies has determined that nearly half of our licensed
officers are over the age of 50. That means, in five or ten
years, our most experienced captains and engineers will be
approaching retirement. Since it may take at least that many
years for a mariner to rise to a senior position of
responsibility in one of our vessels, we can't afford to waste
any time in addressing that future and impending shortfall.
The Coast Guard is currently working on new fitness-for-
duty standards. We need to make sure that, as these medical
standards are implemented, that they make sense and don't
inadvertently cut productive careers short. Mariner wellness
programs will become more and more important to our industry
and the marine community at large. Congress should consider
funding a program that helps promote wellness in the maritime
industry. OMSA would welcome the chance to participate in a
pilot project toward that end.
The foregoing standard industry has a true strength: in the
offshore work boat industry, we can offer Americans the
opportunity to earn a very good living at a skilled profession.
We can take young men and women and give them a clear career
ladder that will move them from positions of entry level,
unskilled laborers to senior positions as licensed masters and
licensed engineers of multi-million dollar vessels. We will
provide the training the mariner needs to advance to a job that
could pay a six figure salary. We also offer a very safe
workplace, one that is statistically safer than most any other
workplace in America, according to OMSA data.
The nature of the work can be hard and stressful, but I
think our industry does offer something that is a fundamental
American value, and that is opportunity. Individuals who come
to work in our industry know, the day they first walk aboard
one of our vessels, that their ability to succeed depends on
their skill, their energy, and their willingness to work hard.
We think that is a very American concept and worth celebrating
and defending. Ultimately, we believe that that value will be
the source of our success as an industry.
We certain welcome the role of the United States Coast
Guard as a partner in our efforts to streamline mariner
education, licensing, and career development, but insist that
they will so continue in that function, that they be adequately
motivated, staffed, and funded for their role in that process.
Thank you very much, and I look forward to your questions.
Mr. Cummings. Thank you very much.
Ms. Hammond.
Ms. Hammond. Good morning. I am Cathy Hammond, CEO of
Inland Marine Service in Hebron, Kentucky. We are a privately
held company in the marine business since 1981. Unlike many
companies in our industry, Inland Marine Service does not own
towboats or barges. We provide the personnel to operate inland
towboats for our client companies. We recruit, train, and
dispatch the crew members for 19 boats operating on the
Mississippi and Ohio River systems.
I am testifying this morning on behalf of the American
Waterways Operators. AWO is a national trade association for
the tugboat, towboat, and barge industry, an industry that
provides family wage jobs for more than 30,000 mariners in the
brown-and blue-water trade.
I love this industry, I believe in it, and I am proud of
it. The towing industry provides great opportunities for young
people looking to start a career or other Americans looking to
make a career change. A college degree is not required. A young
person can begin earning a living wage right away, and six
figure incomes are achievable for those motivated to become
pilots, mates, and captains.
Despite the opportunities our industry offers, a career on
the water is not for everyone. Today, the towing industry faces
a critical shortage of vessel personnel. This is a problem at
two levels: first, attracting new people to the industry and
convincing them to make their career on the water; and, second,
replacing retiring captains and replenishing critical wheel
house positions.
My written testimony describes in some detail the reasons
for this situation. For now, let me simply say that there are
no silver bullets that will solve the industry's personnel
shortage and ensure the necessary supply of well qualified,
well trained mariners to crew our vessels and meet our Nation's
current and future transportation needs. Our industry
recognizes that companies themselves bear the primary
responsibility for making our industry as attractive as
possible to current and prospective employees, and being
creative in our recruitment and retention programs. We are
working hard to do just that.
We also believe that there is a role for Congress and the
Federal agencies to play. The place to start is by eliminating
government-imposed obstacles that make the job of attracting
and retaining qualified crew members more difficult. We offer
the following recommendations. First, government policies and
regulations such as the TWIC program that established barriers
for new hires should be modified. We urgently request your
support for including a practical interim work authority
provision for new hires in the manager's amendment to the Coast
Guard authorization bill.
Second, the Coast Guard should carefully review its
protocols for interacting with vessel personnel and ensure that
a stated objective of honoring the mariner is reflected in its
dealings with the professionals who crew our boats. Routine
interaction with vessel personnel should not be conducted in
the same manner as a for-cause law enforcement boarding.
Third, the Coast Guard should make changes to its licensing
system that eliminates obstacles to advancement while ensuring
high standards of safety. Congress should monitor the Coast
Guard's ongoing effort to restructure and centralize the
licensing program, and ensure that this much needed effort
truly achieves its intended goals.
Fourth, the Maritime Administration should recognize the
changes in the domestic merchant marine and ensure that its
publications reflect the fact that the majority of the onboard
jobs today are on so-called small boats or small vessels such
as towboats and tugboats.
Fifth, Congress and the Maritime Administration should
ensure that the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy modernizes its
focus to reflect the domestic fleet today and help prepare
graduates for jobs in the towing industry.
Finally, we believe MARAD can also play a role in helping
companies and mariners understand and tap into existing
government resources or public-private partnerships for
training and education.
Mr. Chairman, the personnel shortage is a complex problem
and there are no simple solutions. However, if government can
take these items as a work list and industry redoubles its
efforts to improve crew member recruiting and retention,
together we can make a meaningful difference in tackling this
important and growing problem. Thank you very much.
Mr. Cummings. Thank you very much.
Admiral Craine.
Admiral Craine. Mr. Chairman, distinguished Members of this
Subcommittee, thank you for the opportunity to testify today.
While I am with the State University of New York Maritime
College, I am here to represent all of the State maritime
academies. And if I can convey only one message to you today,
it is this: the State maritime academies--from Maine,
Massachusetts, New York, Texas, California, Great Lakes in
Michigan--produce the vast majority of all new licensed
officers in the United States each year. These colleges are an
extraordinary value to our Nation, but they need more
government support to meet the growing demand for merchant
officers who play such a critical role in our national
security.
Last year, these State academies produced 70 percent of all
new licensed officers. This is up from 51 percent just four
years ago, and we expect this upward trend to continue. There
is tremendous demand, as we have already heard, for licensed
officers. Many Federal agencies compete for our graduates along
with the growing need and demand from the commercial industry.
Former Commander of the Military Sealift Command, Admiral
Brewer, stated that our national military sealift requirements
cannot be met without these graduates.
The State maritime academies operate under what is
essentially a Federal mandate and are accountable to Congress,
the Maritime Administration, the Coast Guard, and the
International Maritime Organization for the education and
training of our licensed students. Yet, only 3 percent of our
annual funding comes from the Federal Government. The annual
Federal contribution to the State academies has ranged from $10
million to $13 million a year for all six State academies
combined. The amount provided today is less than it was 15
years ago in real dollars, a 25 percent decrease, while
inflation for higher education has gone up by 70 percent.
One of our most valuable assets is our federally provided
training ships. These vessels provide invaluable, real-world,
hands-on training to our students. The ships are generally
older, former Naval or cargo vessels that need to be converted
for school ship use. A ship assigned to Texas Maritime is not
deployable as a training ship due to lack of Federal funds to
convert it for school use. Three other ships, while usable, are
still awaiting additional Federal dollars to complete their
conversions. The oldest of these six ships is 46 years old and
will soon need to be replaced. These ships are used by the
Federal Government for other global and national emergencies.
Half of them were activated by the President for humanitarian
use following Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. These ships should
be considered national assets and funded accordingly.
Recruiting initiatives play a critical and crucial role in
attracting young men and women into a maritime career. We ask a
great deal of our students, who take in excess of 160 semester
credit hours in order to graduate, versus a norm of 120 to 130
for other college students, largely because of the merchant
marine license courses that are required by the Federal
Government to graduate. They also spend in excess of six months
at sea during their summer and winter breaks.
The State maritime academies offer in-State tuition or a
reduced regional tuition to students from other States, to all
other States, as an incentive to attract more prospective
students. We are also working not only with high schools, but
with elementary schools to get young students interested in a
maritime career. The Federal Government also has a student
incentive program that provides funds directly to students to
offset the cost of uniforms, books, and subsistence in return
for a service obligation in the merchant marine reserve.
Unfortunately, payments in this program have not kept up with
inflation and it is not the incentive that it used to be.
Mr. Chairman, we will continue to carry out our mission of
recruiting--which is our toughest job--educating, and placing
the world's best trained, licensed mariners, but we need more
Federal support in order to meet the growing demand for
licensed merchant officers, for our training ships, our license
programs, and the student incentive program. A stronger
partnership with the Federal Government will better enable us
to serve the needs of our Nation and our world.
Mr. Chairman, I thank you for this opportunity and I look
forward to any questions this Subcommittee might have.
Mr. Cummings. Thank you very much to the panel and our
guests. It is my plan to--we have three votes, one fifteen and
two fives, and so five minutes. So what I plan to do is
reconvene at 12:30. But I would like to get the testimony of
our two witnesses in. We have exactly 11 minutes and 27
seconds.
Captain Beacom.
Captain Beacom. My name is Captain Bill Beacom, and I
appreciate the opportunity to appear before the Committee. I am
a lifetime mariner, second generation. I was on boats by the
time I was five years old. I got my first look at a wheelhouse
all by myself when I was 17 and became a licensed mariner when
I was 20. I am currently in my eleventh issue. I have run all
of the rivers that the Admiral mentioned before and dozens
more.
The problem that we face with the industry is that people
like me can't come up with a viable reason or a logical reason
why anybody should join the industry, and we are the
recruiters. What we find ourselves doing is trying to convince
somebody that has got a certain amount of logic into joining
something that is illogical. The pay looks really good on
paper, but when you get on the vessels, you find that they can
work you up to 14 hours a day the whole time you are on there,
without any intervention by any regulatory agency or anything
else. In a 30-day period, you can actually put in 10 42-hour
weeks, and it isn't conducive to that.
Now, you know, we always figure that we should have to take
our hard knocks, you know, pay our dues, but paying our dues
just doesn't get us anywhere because, when you become a pilot,
you would think that you wouldn't have to work over 12 hours
out of a 24-hour period because that is what the law says. But
the law was in place long before we had 9/11, and since 9/11--
even though before that we already had watch change
conferences, which takes about an hour a day, when the two
people have to be in the wheelhouse at the same time. And, by
the way, any kind of a management system that requires both the
pilot and the captain to be working at the same time breaks the
law, just by the zero sum. If you get 24 hours and you have got
to split it up into watches, and nobody can work any more than
12 hours, any time both are required to be on watch at the same
time, you break the law. So the watch change conference, by the
letter of law, breaks it.
Now we come along with our responsible carrier program, and
the captains and the pilots were pretty well in a position that
they couldn't argue with it, but they had to enforce it, and
that takes time besides navigation time. Then 9/11 came along
and the captain became the vessel security officer. Now, in the
Federal Register it said it probably wouldn't take over two and
a half hours a day to fulfill the requirements of the vessel
safety security officer, but the companies are very proud of
the fact that it only takes about 40 minutes, but that 40
minutes is also outside the 12 hour law.
And then we have the responsibilities of the crew endurance
management system, not counting all of the paperwork stuff that
we have to do in between. So you don't graduate from a 14-hour
day to a 12-hour day, you graduate from a 14-hour day to
another 14-hour day. And two of those hours are outside of the
law. But do you dare say anything? No. Because, if you do, then
you are considered to be a rabble rouser and you will be
looking for other employment; and that is exactly why the
people in this industry are 50 or 55 years old, because that is
the only thing they know how to do, and they are just
tolerating this onerous load that you have put upon us, and
they are just working until the end of it, and very few of them
stay over.
Now, the wages are way up and it looks really good in the
long-term, but a survey was done by John Sutton, the President
of AIM, in 1998, in which he concluded that the average life
expectancy of a towboat captain is 57 years and 8 months. And I
brought that survey up to date, to 2004, and it stayed about
the same; it might have even went down a little bit.
So there is really nothing that would attract a person to
this industry. We are overloaded; they have cut the crews on
the boats. Not only have they cut the crews, the turnover has
made it to where less of the people in the crews have
experience. Because there is only a small amount of the people
in the crews that have experience, they are worked to death;
and a 14-hour day sometimes becomes a relief, because if you
have two or three people on the boat that don't have the
experience, then you have to make up for it.
So what we really need is enforcement of the regulations
that we have, and we need some new manning requirements.
Mr. Cummings. You convinced me.
Mr. Tellez.
Mr. Tellez. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Since I drew the short
straw, I will try to be as quick as possible.
Thank you for the opportunity, and welcome, to Ms.
Richardson, to our world.
I am Augustin Tellez, commonly known as Augie Tellez. I am
the Executive Vice President of the Seafarers A&G District.
Along with our affiliates, including the AMO, we are the
largest representative of mariners employed throughout the
entire spectrum in the maritime world.
Quick snapshots, since we are pressed for time.
Any discussion of manpower issues has to be taken in the
context, first off, in national security. If you talk to a
logistician, he will tell you the strategist plans the war, the
tactician fights the war, and the logistician wins the war, and
the way he does that is by the successful movement and
sustainment of movement of vast volumes of cargo and material
and troops required to win the battle. The major engine fueling
that successful effort is the United States merchant marine and
the manpower pool required to staff it.
Besides the importance of the vessels themselves, more
importantly, the U.S. commercial fleet, a viable and effective
U.S. commercial fleet is a key component because it provides
the employment base by which everything revolves.
The other part of that merchant marine effort is the
organic fleet or the military ships, including MARAD's RRF
vessels. One of the lessons learned during the first Gulf War
was that the Nation could not depend on laid-up old vessels
without crews to be activated in a short period of time and go
to war. We learned that lesson very quickly. Besides mechanical
failures, it taxed the manpower pool employed at that time.
In order to address those issues, we changed the way we did
business and we came up with the RRF ROS program, which puts a
cadre of crew members on all those laid-up vessels to not only
maintain them and keep them ready, but also to provide a
nucleus crew for any activation crew.
Having said that, the commercial fleet being so important,
we would like to thank this Committee, this Congress for their
support and their continued support for programs like the
Maritime Security Program, Cargo Preference, and all the other
programs and policies that keep that commercial fleet viable.
It is also amazing that, having talked about the importance
of the RRF vessel, we are a little dismayed at the government's
efforts, in order to realize some short-term financial savings,
it is looking to reduce and eliminate entirely some of those
RRF vessels and their crews, which exasperates the problem we
are here talking about because it eliminates employment base
and jobs.
In general, the Union is not experiencing the shortage, at
least on the deep sea side that we are here talking about. Part
of that is because of the viability of the commercial fleet. It
is also because we meet the challenges of the manpower issues
through the aforementioned school in Piney Point. It just
celebrated its fortieth anniversary and in that time has
graduated 22,000 apprentices, new recruits. It has also
graduated 100,000 upgraders and issued to them 238,000
certificates, many of them Coast Guard certified and STCW
certified.
In anticipation of the boom in the Gulf mentioned by Mr.
Taylor, a few years ago we met with our contracted companies
and came up and developed an inland license program in
conjunction with our contracted companies. They support it,
they sponsor it. That, augmented by an inland apprentice
program, creates kind of a cradle-to-the-grave situation where
we recruit people specifically for that industry, ultimate
objective of getting their license.
In conclusion, let me just say the manpower issue, any
manpower issue can be handled as long as you control and manage
the pipeline efficiently. And as long as there are jobs,
viable, effective jobs out there, you can manage any--meet any
challenge or manpower issue.
Also, before closing, my one comment on TWIC. Everyone else
made their comments on TWIC. I find it amazing that we are
sitting here talking about TWIC and imposing more stringent
regulations and background checks on the most regulated people
already, American citizens, and the very vessels that Mr.
Bishop was talking about are transporting LNG gas into our
Country with who knows who on those ships.
Thank you for your time.
Mr. Cummings. Thank you very much. We will see you all at
12:30.
[Recess.]
Mr. Cummings. Thank you all very much.
Admiral Craine, can you briefly speak about the partnership
that your college is establishing with the several maritime
high schools? And can you indicate whether you believe ties
between such high schools and the Nation's maritime colleges
could be increased to create a seamless educational path to
draw students from high schools to the maritime academies?
Admiral Craine. Yes, sir, I would be happy to do that. The
short answer to your question is yes. We are reaching out to
these high schools to see what we can do to make it not only
easier for these students to be able to come to our schools,
but to get these students interested. As I mentioned in my
testimony, recruiting is tough to try and convince a young 17
or 18 year old that life at sea and the maritime industry is
something for them.
One of the things that we're doing next Tuesday, I will be
with Art Sulzer, Captain Sulzer, who will be testifying in the
next panel, and his school that he represents in Philadelphia,
the one that you mentioned_the Maritime Industries Academy in
Baltimore_along with two others, on Tuesday to talk about what
we can do to provide curriculum to their schools that will
provide a broader overview of what the opportunities are, so
that the students can actually get started before they come.
Mr. Cummings. It seems like in other industries, there has
been more of an effort to try to get to our kids at a young
age, high school age. Why does it seem like we are a little
behind with regard to this industry? Why do you think that is?
Admiral Craine. I don't know if we are behind or whether
these ideas of partnering, it is just a new, it is a great idea
that we need, perhaps we could have been doing before. But we
have realized that we need to reach out to high schools. And it
is not just the rising seniors or those that are graduating,
but we have to start at a younger age.
When I was the chief of education and training for the
Navy, when I was on active duty, we had a program called
Starbase Atlantis, where we learned that it was at the fifth
grade level, if we were going to attract youngsters to have an
interest in the sciences and the math that we needed to get
them at the fifth grade level. That was the knee in the curve,
where you could get the biggest bang for the buck. And we are
doing that on our campus and I know the others are as well. We
have our oceanography, meteorology professors, science
professors, working with elementary schools. Just two weeks ago
we honored Eleanor Roosevelt Intermediate School from
Washington Heights in Manhattan as one of those schools that
has been working with us.
And there are others. It is not something that is new to
us, but the formal relationship we are finding is very helpful.
We worked an agreement last week with Valley Forge Military
Academy to accept any student that was accepted to their junior
college, they have a high school and then a junior college. Any
student that was accepted to their junior college would
automatically be accepted to ours. Every day we are looking for
new opportunities to establish these partnerships. We are
really excited about the one that we are going to be talking
about next week. We have three students from the Harbor School
in Manhattan. They are freshmen, but they seem to be doing
well, and we want more of them.
Mr. Cummings. That is wonderful.
Mr. Rodriguez, can you describe the extent to which the
criminalization of mariners, you think, is affecting the
recruitment? When I talked to the Admiral a little earlier in
the first panel, he didn't seem to think that, well, I kind of
got the impression that he didn't think that it was as bad as
you make it sound in your testimony. Could you comment on that,
please?
Mr. Rodriguez. Yes, Mr. Chairman. Let me begin my answer by
pointing out, what I have here is a report that was done back
in May of 2002. I remember this effort because I was part of
it, it was a very broad-based effort at coming up with some of
the answers to the questions we are asking today in this
hearing. And one of them is, one of the aspects of life at sea
that, if I can take a moment to describe, these are very high
level people from industry, from labor, from the Coast Guard,
from the Maritime Administration, we all got together. We
started at Kings Point in the spring of 2001. We had a number
of meetings, things, as I recall, got a little overcome by the
events of September 2001.
But one of the aspects that this very broad-based group
came up with, one of the problems that we had recruiting and
retaining people into our industry, was criminalization. And
that is in this report, and I would like to provide that for
you.
Over the years that I have been involved in the maritime
industry, there has been more and more regulation put upon us.
Mariners can be prosecuted under a number of different Federal
statutes for discharging oil into the water, these are mainly
environmental protection laws. And I can tell you that the
level of morale on board ships has been affected. If you can
imagine, it is not just the person who is being investigated or
prosecuted directly who is affected; you have this whole
mindset of the crew, particularly amongst the officers, that
every time they go up that gangway, they may be liable for
something that happens.
So I hear about it. I worked at one time in the Merchant
Marine Academy handling the training for a lot of the cadets
who came through there. Some of the young graduates who had
problems, they had an incident, would call me in my new job and
say, I am thinking about getting out of the business: I got
investigated. So it is affecting the morale of this industry. I
would venture to say that it goes right from the inland people
to the deep sea folks.
Mr. Cummings. So we are looking into the ALJ situation and
hopefully, that might be helpful in trying to address that
issue.
I want to go to you, Captain Beacom. In your testimony, you
raised some very serious concerns about safety in the towing
industry. You believe that manning, in particular, is often
insufficient in part because the Coast Guard does not have
adequate resources to ensure safety in the industry and in part
because you believe management is essentially filtering
information that passes to the Coast Guard through safety
committees. Can you comment on how prevalent unsafe conditions
you have described are in the towing industry?
Captain Beacom. Well, a lot of it is based on the fact that
they have cut the size of the crews to the point where it is
impossible to operate safely. In 1988, I worked on a vessel
that had a 10 man crew. That vessel is currently operating with
a six man crew, doing exactly the same thing, and there is no
automation that would lead to that downsizing. So you either
have to come to the conclusion that the people that were
operating the vessel in 1988 were idiots and they were paying
four people not to do anything, or you have to come to the
conclusion that those six people are now doing the work of ten.
And any time you put that kind of an onerous workload on
people, you decrease the amount of safety.
Now, because of the fact that there is an onerous workload,
the turnover changes. And I talked with people in both Dupont
and Shell that say when you get more than a 20 percent turnover
that any safety management program is nullified by the lack of
knowledge within the group. And we have way more than a 20
percent turnover on the deck on most towboats. So if you had
adequate manning, you would eliminate this. Not only would you
eliminate it, you would level the playing field so those
companies who bid jobs on the basis of inadequate manning would
not have a financial advantage against those who are trying to
do things right.
Mr. Cummings. Thank you.
Mr. LaTourette.
Mr. LaTourette. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I apologize that other responsibilities didn't let me
listen to your testimony, but I read it before.
Mr. Rodriguez, I want to pick up with where the Chairman
was on the criminalization issue, because we did have a rather
lengthy hearing on the administrative law judge process, and I
came away convinced that the Chairman was on the right path. I
am a big believer that people can accept results, even when
they lose, as long as they think they have been treated fairly.
You don't always win, but you have to be treated fairly.
If criminalization is one of the findings of this group
that got together in 2001, what do you think the answer is?
Clearly, we can't have people dumping oil in the water, we
can't have people getting drunk and running their boats into
rocks and things like that. So what would be your observation,
that we should look more to civil penalties? What do you think
we need to do?
Mr. Rodriguez. Mr. LaTourette, I believe the answer, well,
I don't want to confuse the ALJ issue and this issue of
criminalization. We appreciate your looking at that problem. We
are hopeful that you will come out with the right solution.
Criminalization is, let me start by saying, anyone who
willfully or intentionally discharges oil into the water is a
criminal. That is clearly against our environmental law, it is
against the public good. It should not be protected.
But accidents do happen, and they happen in this high risk
maritime industry. What we object to is under some of the
environmental statutes, we have strict liability for what
occurs, whether it is an accident or not. I think looking at
the way those statutes are applied and the effect on this
workforce, and again, it is not that it is always a direct
effect. It gets into people's minds, it gets into the way they
do business. They get overly protective, the crew begins to
split between the junior officers and the senior officers who
are probably going to be on the hook for anything that happens.
I think a step in the right direction, and it is in my
testimony, one of my recommendations is that we separate the
investigations for trying to get to the cause of an accident
and possibly a criminal action later on, and insulate whatever
we find out in an accident investigation from any criminal
prosecution that may result.
Mr. LaTourette. Well, I think that is a good idea. We just
had a big train derailment in my district, and two agencies
came in, actually the EPA wandered in too, but we had the FRA
come in, NTSB came in. NTSB is tasked with figuring out what
happened. Then FRA is tasked with figuring out whether somebody
should be held accountable for breaking the rules. Is that the
model that you are sort of pitching to us?
Mr. Rodriguez. Yes. The work that we do at IMO is kind of
heading in that direction. There is a code of practice, it is a
very long title and I haven't really committed it to memory.
But there was a code of practice for the disparate treatment of
seafarers after a maritime accident. And it has some principles
in there. And one of the principles is that one of the goals of
the investigation is to determine what the cause was and to
prevent those kinds of accidents happening in the future.
If you don't have the criminal side and the accident
investigation side separated, it is very difficult to get at
that root cause.
Mr. LaTourette. I would think that is right, because if the
person believes that they are going to be on the hook
criminally, they are going to clam up. I mean, why would you
want to cooperate and sort of incriminate yourself potentially
or provide some information to somebody that could be used
against your penal interests?
Mr. Rodriguez. It can be self-defeating, and the
international maritime community is beginning to realize that.
Mr. LaTourette. Okay, and is that included some place? I
know you said this in your testimony, these recommendations you
are talking about, are they written down some place? Could you
send those to us?
Mr. Rodriguez. I certainly will. If I need to clarify them,
if I need to elaborate on them, I certainly will.
Mr. LaTourette. Thank you so much.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Cummings. Just two questions. Mr. Annessa, you talked
about the maritime industry's ability to recruit individuals
from areas that are not near the water and that might in fact
face a lack of local employment opportunities. What percentage
of the people working for the member firms of the offshore
marine service association live in areas that are not near the
water and particularly in areas that are economically
depressed? Can you give me some kind of ball park figure?
Mr. Annessa. Yes, sir. I am not sure that without referring
to our survey we could give you the exact componentry.
Mr. Cummings. That is why I said ballpark.
Mr. Annessa. I would suggest probably 75 percent of the
mariners are in the coastal regions, the balance in the inland
areas. I know that our particular company's case, when we look
at our national demography, we have literally employees that
live nearly every State in the Union, though the preponderance
are in the Gulf States, Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama,
and then we have a high concentration in the Northeast, New
York, Maine, and then in the Hampton Roads area, around
Virginia, and then Florida. That seems to be the predominant
locations where our workforce, and if it is indicative of a
cross-section of the rest of the Country in our industry, then
it would be probably appropriate. Seventy-five percent in the
coastal areas, 25 percent in the inland areas.
And one of the premises of our written testimony to attract
mariners or candidates for employment in the marine industry in
let's say inland or marginally employed areas would be to be
more proactive in our communication of the opportunities that
the industry affords potential prospects, particularly when a
lot of the companies pay the transportation or provide a
transportation allowance that allows the employee to cover the
cost of moving back and forth to his assigned vessel from his
home. It is a remarkable benefit in our industry that is
available in very few others that I am aware of, with the
possible exception of the airline industry where that travel is
paid, or compensated to the employee to move from his location
of domicile to his assigned vessel.
Mr. Cummings. Do you worry about the future of these
companies and their ability to get the employees they need?
Does that concern you greatly?
Mr. Annessa. It does concern me, sir, but it is not a grave
concern. Because I do believe that we are on a momentum here
that will, I hope, mitigate some of the busts and booms that
our particular industry has experienced in recent years. We
talk anecdotally about $80 per barrel oil as a motivator for
continued investment by our particular client group in
developing the offshore oil prospects in this Country. But our
fleets are predominantly focused on an international
capability, again, it is another great advantage that our
industry affords, is that even if our vessels are not able to
be employed in the U.S., those U.S.-flagged vessels can be
employed in foreign locations and employ a certain complement
of U.S. mariners. I think we are in a period at least for the
foreseeable future of a prolonged opportunity for full
employment. And with that momentum, I believe we will begin to
attract new entrants into our business.
The opportunities for a very predictable career path and
the ability for an individual to attain a very well-paying job
if he applies him or herself to achieving the credentialing
that is needed is a very powerful and attractive for the
candidates.
Mr. Cummings. Can you tell me how much Offshore Marine
Service Association generally spends on training their
employees, and particularly for unlicensed mariners seeking to
move ahead in their careers?
Mr. Annessa. Yes, sir, approximately, unlicensed mariners
from a greenfield start of what we would call an entry level
employee that would be an ordinary seaman, we commit
approximately $3,000 to $6,000 to take them through the STCW
certification and get them proficient, for example, for the
deck department to be a rating and performing part of a
navigation watch, which is one of the certifications they
require. Almost all of our member companies are bearing the
cost of that themselves, reimbursing or paying for that
training of those individual employees. The career path
continues to move from that rating level to mate or in the case
of the interim, to qualified man or chief engineer onto captain
of the bridge. Commitment of training dollars over a six to ten
year career path, which is necessary not only to accomplish the
course work, but to achieve the sea time that is required, may
result in a commitment by the companies of anywhere from
$10,000 to as much as $40,000, depending on the standard of
certification that is attained by the mariner.
Now, certainly, we, like many of the other shipping
companies under the U.S. registry, do try to seek candidates
from the maritime academies, the State schools and Kings Point.
They come with basically a third mate or third engineer's
certification that they have earned through participation in
the academic environment and the sea time they have achieved
through those academies. But we also have to develop those
mariners ourselves internally through what we call commonly the
hawespipe, fellow, men and women that come up through the ranks
to achieve those same certifications, at a cost either to
themselves or generally borne by the companies that is not very
much different than what they would pay or what the cost of an
academy education might cost.
Mr. Cummings. Thank you all very much.
Mr. Tellez, nobody asked you a question, did you just need
to say something? Go ahead and say it. We definitely want to
hear you.
Mr. Tellez. I would invite you all to Piney Point so you
can see first-hand what happens down there in terms of training
and certification. Come on down.
Mr. Cummings. I have been there, but I will come back.
Mr. Tellez. I would invite the rest of the Committee.
Mr. Cummings. All right. Thank you very much.
Our third and final panel, and I want to thank everybody
for waiting around, we really appreciate it, Captain Arthur
Sulzer, a Board Member with the Maritime Academy High School in
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; Captain Jeff Slesinger, the
Director of Safety and Training with Western Towboat Company;
and Berit Eriksson, Former Executive Director of the Pacific
Coast Maritime Consortium.
Mr. Sulzer.
TESTIMONY OF CAPTAIN ARTHUR H. SULZER, USN (RETIRED), BOARD
MEMBER, MARITIME ACADEMY CHARTER HIGH SCHOOL; CAPTAIN JEFF
SLESINGER, WESTERN TOWBOAT COMPANY, CHAIRPERSON, COMMITTEE ON
STRATEGIC PLANNING, PACIFIC MARINE TOWING INDUSTRY PARTNERS;
BERIT ERIKSSON, FORMER EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, PACIFIC COAST
MARITIME CONSORTIUM
Captain Sulzer. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Chairman and distinguished Members, it is a great
pleasure to appear before this Committee. I am Captain Art
Sulzer, a second generation mariner whose father served as a
merchant marine officer in World War II. I have been in this
industry my whole life and I have witnessed first-hand the
effects of America's decline as a shipbuilder and ship-
operating Nation.
As one of the focuses of this hearing is shortness of
mariners, I actually find that heartening that this may portend
a change in our industry and some future growth.
I am going to principally discuss maritime education at the
entry and crew level, where our greatest shortages appear. My
paper, which you have, is five sections. I am going to skip and
just cover the last three in an effort to save time.
Most people are familiar with mariner training such as the
cabin boy serving tea on the Titanic, the powder monkeys
serving cannon balls to gunners in movies such as Master and
Commander. This is the impression many Americans have of
maritime training, and they were right. It is a hands-on
training, although it has changed quite a bit since those days.
Today's mariner needs to be highly trained, needs to be
dedicated and motivated. This applies to all positions on board
ships, not just the master. That is what I want to address.
Many of my colleagues today talked about current issues and
problems. I would basically echo those: aging workforce,
compensation issues, documentation, renewal problems. But the
one area that was not talked about today that I want to focus
on is our maritime heritage. This is not talked about very
often. It is most overlooked, and unfortunately, the American
public has largely forgotten that we are an island nation,
dependent on waterborne commerce for most of our goods and
services.
Now, traditionally, American mariners have come from the
European nations and certain areas of Africa, Asia and the
Pacific. For the most part, they were also largely immigrants.
Policies in the 1990s and security requirements have cut off
the source of mariners. I believe we need to create a new
generation of mariners in this Country with a tradition of
maritime seafaring. And I believe that the group will come from
our under-served urban students in America's cities, which can
use this program as an opportunity to escape poverty and to
find their ways to good, meaningful careers. That is what I
think the maritime high school movement is about.
Specifically in maritime education, I got involved in 2003
as a board member opening a charter school in Philadelphia. We
opened with 125 students. As of this year, we now have 700 and
we have a waiting list of over 300 students. We will graduate
our first seniors this year.
Along with that, I was also completing my doctoral work at
the University of Pennsylvania, and because of my involvement,
I took the opportunity to start to conduct research on this
growing movement. When I thought I had one school, lo and
behold, I found there are over 16 in the Country and growing.
My research specifically is entitled Maritime Tactile Education
for Under-Served Urban Students in America: Sailing to Success.
Presently there are 16 maritime middle and high schools around
the Country that are about 350 to 400 students.
What I have done in working with these schools, I have
grouped them into a couple of categories. The first thing is
program style, how they conduct their training. There is the
integrated method, vocational, apprentice and academic.
The other way that I group these schools is by program
type; what type of outcome do they desire. We have general
maritime studies, which is a broad program; industry-specific,
such as fishing, marina, tug barge; company-specific, where a
particular company takes an interest in a school looking for
future employees, and lastly regional. I have given examples of
some of these fine schools in my paper.
What I would like to talk about is how we can help these
schools succeed. Now, to help them, you have to see some of the
positive outcomes. This has been parent-student interest, the
graduation rates are up, comportment and student behavior has
increased as a result of the maritime programs, academic grades
have come up, and graduation upon employment.
You have asked me to come, I hope that I have excited you.
I have some suggestions for you on how you can help. These
suggestions include promotion of conferences on maritime
education, development of grant programs on maritime regional
awareness, video materials, review of aid restrictions which
impact apprentice programs, continuation of maritime vocational
training, encourage Federal agencies to continue to work with
the maritime schools and create and fund a national cooperative
research program in marine transportation to serve as a conduit
and a source for these efforts and increase public awareness.
I see a positive future in maritime education and I am
encouraged by the results we have seen in our own school and I
hope this will be a continuing trend. Thank you, gentlemen.
Mr. Cummings. Thank you very much.
Captain Slesinger?
Captain Slesinger. Good afternoon, Mr. Chairman. On behalf
of the Washington State Skill Panel, I want to thank you for
inviting us to speak about how we are currently dealing with
the personnel crisis in the towing industry. I am Captain Jeff
Slesinger, Chairperson of the Skill Panels Committee on
Strategic Planning.
I am also a working tugboat captain and Director of Safety
and Training for Western Towboat. Western Towboat is a family-
owned tug and barge company located in Seattle. We, as well as
other west coast tug and barge companies, provide a vital
transportation link between ports on the west coast and Alaska.
There are many communities in Alaska where the only means of
transporting critical supplies is with a tug and barge. Our
work is diverse and essential. We move 600 foot tank barges
filled with petroleum products; we tow freight barges stacked
with containers; we tow ocean-going barges carrying rail cars
on deck. We do this year-round through Pacific storms and
Alaskan winters.
I can tell you from my own personal experience that this
work is challenging and very rewarding. But frankly, we have
serious concerns about our ability to crew vessels today and in
the future. We face challenges on all fronts: recruitment,
training and retention of competent and qualified mariners.
The Skill Panel's success in meeting those challenges is a
result of a highly-organized, non-partisan collaboration
between business, education, labor and the local workforce and
economic development councils. The one word I hope you
associate with our success and our testimony today is
partnership. We found solutions by partnering with government
and industry resources. And we would like the Federal
Government to play a larger role in that partnership.
Over the past two years, our skill panel has developed two
highly effective and efficient partnership models that have a
record of demonstrated success. The first is the Skill Panel
itself. The catalyst for the panel's formation is the same
fundamental personnel problem we share with the rest of the
towing and marine transportation industry. We have good family
wage jobs. We have people who want those jobs.
What we don't have is a clear, coordinated career path. We
don't have good answers to the man or woman who is on a dock
and asks, how can I get a job on one of those tugs? What kind
of training do I need and where can I get it?
Although these are simple questions, the process of
developing simple answers is more complex. This is because the
source of these answers lies in different sectors. Industry,
Government and educational institutions all house partial
solutions. What is needed is an organization that connects
these sectors, takes partial solutions and makes them whole.
This is the primary role of our Washington State Skill Panel.
The second example of the successful approach is our
support of the Workboat Mate Vocational Apprenticeship Program.
In 2005, the Pacific Maritime Institute, located in Seattle,
pioneered this approach for towing vessels. This program
provides a defined career pathway to the level of mate.
At the end of the two year process, we have an individual
who has confidence in his skills, because he has already put
them to work in an on the job environment. The Coast Guard has
confidence that this individual has met not just the certifying
standard, but the intent of that standard. And the companies
have confidence that this individual has been trained to a
common, accepted standard, one that works in practice, not just
on paper.
The program's success is a direct result of a partnership
between an individual cadet, the Coast Guard, the towing
industry and the maritime training center. All bring commitment
to the process, and all reap the rewards.
The benefit of this program goes far beyond the original
partners. The local communities have gained an individual whose
family wage job contributes to the local and regional
economies. He or she helps ensure that a critical link in the
region's transportation network continues to function in a safe
and effective manner. This is truly an example of how a rising
tide floats all boats.
This type of coordinated effort is readily available to
other regions and could be expanded to all sea-going positions
on tugs. However, funding for the Skill Panel will soon run out
unless new Government resources are made available.
Mr. Chairman, we very much appreciate the opportunity to
appear before you today. Our Skill Panel stands ready to work
as a contributing partner with this Committee and other Federal
agencies. Together, we can create clear, viable pathways for
training qualified individuals seeking a career in the towing
industry. Thank you.
Mr. Cummings. Thank you very much, Captain.
Ms. Eriksson?
Ms. Eriksson. Good afternoon, Chairman Cummings and Members
of the Subcommittee.
My name is Berit Eriksson, and I hold an endorsement as an
Able Seaman Unlimited and I am a member of the Sailor's Union
of the Pacific.
As a working mariner and maritime workforce development
specialist, I would like to thank you for the opportunity to
address the Committee on the education and workforce
development challenges facing the United States maritime
industry. The U.S. Merchant Marine is diverse and its workforce
problems are complex. I am convinced that mariner workforce
development solutions must be as diverse as our industry. I
want to primarily address and suggest a potential solution to
the problem of the financial challenges facing merchant
mariners as they attempt to advance upwards through the
maritime career ladder. Commonly known as the hawespipe, it
speaks to the difficult transformation of unlicensed mariners
into licensed mariners.
First, some background which speaks to the finding of
solutions through partnerships. In 2001, the Pacific Coast
Maritime Consortium, or the PCMC, was created to meet the
immediate training needs brought on by the then-looming 2002
deadline of the STCW Convention. It was a multi-State
partnership approach encompassing Alaska, Washington, Oregon,
California and Hawaii, and included five maritime unions and
six maritime employers.
From 2001 to 2006, the PCMC worked to ensure that qualified
U.S. mariners were available in sufficient numbers for the
maritime sectors of the West Coast region. During this period,
it became clear that the advancement from unlicensed to
licensed mariner positions was practically eliminated as a
result of the new regulations. We could not accept that, and
the Consortium turned to addressing the issue.
As you may be aware, the STCW Convention had created
certain unfunded training and certification mandates, which
seriously impacted the ability of the industry to meet
licensing requirements. Through a grant funded project, we
found that it took a little more than two years for an
unlicensed mariner working in the towing industry to complete
all the certifications required for a third mate towing license
at the approximate cost of $16,000 just for the courses. That
is not counting travel and room and board expenses.
Most working mariners find this too daunting a financial
hurdle to career advancement. This is a cause for grave concern
for when we consider that approximately 95 percent of the mates
and masters in the U.S. offshore and coastways towing sector
have come through the hawsepipe.
To develop solutions to these challenges, the PCMC hosted
several regional maritime roundtable meetings in Alaska,
Hawaii, California and Washington with the Skills Panel, where
there emerged a strong consensus on the concept of the maritime
education loan program. It is modeled after the existing and
successful Teachers Educational Forgivable Loan program. The
program would provide unlicensed mariners with the means to
pursue higher certification by vaulting the financial obstacles
by a Government loan that is forgivable only upon demonstration
of long-term commitment to the industry.
With this in mind, we drafted sample legislative language
as a possible solution to the financial challenges of advancing
in a maritime career. The main points of the concept are: the
program would be administered by the Maritime Administration;
to encourage retention, the loan would be forgiven if the
mariner completes 36 months of sea time; the loan may not
exceed a lifetime total of $60,000; the loan may be used for
tuition, travel to and from training facilities, room and
board, books, loan guarantee fees and other required fees. The
loan program would initially be a five year pilot project.
The training institutions would be chosen based on
geographic diversity, their ability to administer a Federal
program and their possession of appropriate U.S. Coast Guard-
approved sites, courses and instructors. Student eligibility
would be based on their holding a valid merchant marine
document, committing to completing the course of instruction
and serving as a merchant marine officer or unlicensed mariner
upon the completion of the course of instruction.
The appropriate office for administration of the loan
program would be the Office of Maritime Workforce Development
within the Maritime Administration. This office should also be
the site for other innovative workforce development programs
that need to be integrated with the U.S. Coast Guard regulatory
requirements. One such program could be a Secretary's
discretionary grant program, which exists in Labor, and it
would well here, I think, which could fund maritime workforce
demonstration projects such as multi-State training projects,
demographic and industry needs research projects, entry level
enrichment programs and youth school-to-career programs.
In conclusion, I would like to thank you again for this
opportunity to present some possible solutions for recruitment,
training and retention challenges facing the merchant mariners
and the maritime industry today.
Mr. Cummings. Thank you all very much.
Mr. Slesinger, tell me, how difficult is it for a young
person who is not a member of a union to get the training they
need to move ahead in the maritime industry?
Captain Slesinger. Right now, it is I would say a matter of
circumstance. For instance, for a non-union company, such as
ourselves, if you approached us, some of our best employees are
those that have no background and are basically walking up and
applying. But what has to happen is a relationship has to
develop between that company and that individual where it is a
mentor relationship, it carries them through the process.
Because there really is no formalized structure or organization
that could lead that person through there.
So it is very dependent on the companies they contact and
it is very dependent on the type of relationship they can
establish with that company.
Mr. Cummings. Captain Sulzer, you were talking about how
you went from, in Philadelphia, I think you said, from 125
students to 700, is that right?
Captain Sulzer. That is correct, sir.
Mr. Cummings. One of the things that I, what I have tried
to figure out is that when I look at the Baltimore school, I
think we have a lot of students coming, and some of them
genuinely have an interest in maritime. Many of them are just
looking for a decent school to go to where they are going to
feel safe and feel as if there is learning taking place. I hate
to even say that, but it is true.
So I am trying to figure, and because of that, they have
had a tremendous success rate in the five or six years they
have been there. I don't think it has so much necessarily to do
with the curriculum. I think that is going to change, though,
and I think that what is going to happen is that the curriculum
is going to drive it. I think Baltimore will have a problem in
the next two or three years if not, probably less than that,
with a waiting list of people trying to get into this school.
What do you see as the problems you have seen so far with
the schools you have been involved with? How easy or difficult
is it to create a curriculum that truly trains them to go into
the maritime industry and do you get the impression that a lot
of these young people are basically going to these schools,
like I said, to get a decent education, not necessarily going
into the industry? And I am sure there are advantages of just
having that knowledge, even if they never go into the industry,
many of them will go on to college, and may not want to go the
route of the industry.
What do you see are the problems and what do you see is
attracting young people to the Philadelphia school?
Captain Sulzer. You are correct, a good, safe school is the
first attraction to the school, since these students don't know
what maritime is, as I mentioned before. Our job is, once they
get there, to fire up an interest. We chose to start at fifth
grade. As Admiral Craine said, the difference in education in
fourth and fifth grade, a student goes from being fed education
to eating education on their own.
So we chose an earlier model to get these kids interested.
In our early program, grades five to nine is what I call the
song of the sea, where we take maritime and we infuse it in all
the regular subjects. Pilgrims came over on the Mayflower; that
is the last most of us ever hear of the Mayflower. It is a
ship, it had to navigate. So we start to infuse this at the
early grades to get them interested in our programs when they
move into ninth grade.
Now, I can give a concrete example of how maritime actually
helps these students improve. One particular school that has
been around for a while, again, most of these schools have only
opened since 2000, so the track record is short. Mar Vista,
which is in the San Diego area, has had a long partnership with
the Military Sealift Command. They have had a maritime program
for five years and they have graduates. What they started to
show me the data is that, again, in most of these inner-cities
schools, if you show up and go to class, you are going to pass.
That is not true every place else.
What happened in this school is, the students, because of
Coast Guard requirements for training and passing and
documentation, they had to do more than show up in the maritime
classes to get by. And an amazing thing happened: they worked
hard. When they went back to their regular classes in the
afternoon, the brain didn't get shut off. And lo and behold,
what started to come up was English, science and the other
courses. Because what they learned by making the commitment to
maritime, which they made, we didn't force them, is they
learned their own skills and they started to develop. That is
what really excites me.
I will be honest, at the end of the day, if not a single
graduate of Maritime Academy Charter School works on the water,
but everyone graduates, we hit a home run. Because you know
graduation rates inner city. I have to say that as an educator.
But I am fully convinced that a percentage of those
students will go into maritime, and as they come back to the
neighborhoods, which they can do, because of transportation,
they will talk to their fellow neighbors and that will grow. We
have 300 on the waiting list right now. So I am convinced this
works and I have seen it.
Mr. Cummings. One of the interesting things, I have visited
the Maritime Academy in Baltimore on several occasions. But my
last visit, I so happened to get there when the former marine
chief warrant officer, Officer Williams, was drilling these
students and teaching them to march. And I was just amazed that
these kids were doing it. It sort of blew me away that
everybody was in line, and he has his marine uniform on.
And the reason why I raise that is you talk about the
quasi-military nature, and if you have a quasi-military
component there, that it helps with behavior. I kind of saw
that, I saw kids that were, I think, I get the impression that
they almost want the discipline, they almost want the
structure. And I can hardly wait to see them in their uniforms.
That, I am sure, will be an even greater boost.
In Baltimore, as many districts are dealing with, we are
dealing with gangs and the phenomenon of gangs. We are finding
that there are certain things that attract kids to gangs, it is
the discipline, it is the family, it is the belonging, things
of that nature. When I talk to some of these kids and ask them
why do they like the kids, a lot of the very things that other
kids tell me attract them to gangs, the identical types of
things that attract them to the school, that closeness, that
discipline, somebody looking over your shoulder, people going
in the same direction that you are going in.
Now, of course the gangs are going negative, the Academy is
going positive. Could you comment on that, please?
Captain Sulzer. I agree with you. In fact, I just spoke
with the lieutenant colonel who runs Western Maritime School up
in Buffalo. He and I were talking, and he was about ready to
pull his hair out, because he has been there about two years. I
said, stay the course. It is going to be rough the first couple
of years. I had to sit on discipline boards and everything
else, and I felt like Captain Blye sometimes.
But you go through a learning curve where those who are
going to get with the program stick with it, and then that
number swells and those that aren't going to get with the
program leave. Once you turn the corner, the momentum grows.
One program we talked about is typically, you give out demerits
for bad behavior.
Well, we talked about giving out doubloons as a reward. We
ignore the 90 percent of the kids who sit there and want to
learn and we focus on the 10 percent. So what I've been
advocating is we give out doubloons for making the grade.
Everybody knows doubloons, pirates, et cetera. This is what the
kids like. You earn these doubloons for good grades and good
behavior, and you redeem them at the end of the month. How
about some positive rewards instead of negative?
So I agree with you. But the schools will go through a
learning curve and then they will turn the corner and it is
only going to get better. That is the message I am trying to
get out there.
Mr. Cummings. This is my last question. Is there something
unique about maritime, say a maritime curriculum in achieving
the things that you and I just talked about, as opposed to
perhaps a medical type curriculum, preparing them for medical
school, preparing them for other types of things? Is there
something very unique about maritime that would cause that kind
of effect that we are now talking about?
Captain Sulzer. Well, as I said, we are an island nation.
We all got here by a boat a long time ago. And it is something
I believe that people thrive on. When I go to meetings, parents
come up to me, they want to know how to get their kids
involved. They don't know anything about it, it ignites
something in people. I can't put my finger on it. I guess it is
just the way we are in this Country. But it is awareness, and
it is very important to get the parents involved at an early
stage, and maritime will bring them to a meeting. They like it,
and that is critical.
Mr. Cummings. Yes, Ms. Eriksson?
Ms. Eriksson. Mr. Cummings, when I was working with the
Pacific Coast Maritime Consortium, we did have a grant that
funded Mar Vista High School, partially. So I was the project
coordinator down in San Diego at the time. And the kids were
going to school in the building I was in.
And in answer to you, what was one of the things about the
curriculum that really got them, and strangely enough, because
I was a working mariner, this happens on a ship, the kids who
were like the engine kids and the kids who were like the deck
kids, they called them the black gang and the knuckle draggers.
They identified with being marines. They had that, as you said,
that identity like they are not in the gang any more. But now
they are like deckies or they are like the black gang. And they
take great pride in that. So I think that is part of what
happens within that curriculum.
Mr. Cummings. Thank you very much.
Mr. LaTourette.
Mr. LaTourette. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank all of
you for your testimony.
Captain Sulzer, is the Mar Vista program the oldest of the
16 that you have laid out in your testimony?
Captain Sulzer. No, it is not. It is the most focused,
specifically for direct employment upon graduation. Actually,
some of the schools go back into 1991. But one of the things
is, and I have kind of put them together, I have to clarify,
there are maritime schools and there are marine. They are
different. Marine schools have typically been around a little
bit longer, there are several in Florida. Marine deals with the
sciences and biology and oceanography. Maritime is a fairly new
phenomenon. And they can work together and they can work in
concert, and some schools actually have both programs.
So Mar Vista is focused on marine employment, deep sea, and
has a partnership particularly with MSE.
Mr. LaTourette. And did you indicate that Mar Vista
actually has graduated a class?
Captain Sulzer. Yes, sir, they have.
Mr. LaTourette. And I know that the Chairman was talking
about something that is of great interest to me, and that is, I
think it is wonderful to get graduation rates up and so forth
and so on, but if we are dealing with people actually going
into the business, is there any data available based on that
graduating class of how many kids chose to make maritime a
career?
Captain Sulzer. There is, sir. I don't have it in front of
me. It is not great, but it is there. And I guess one
indication is, I have people looking for our seniors that
haven't even graduated yet. So there is a large interest from
employers. And again, I tell employers, I used to be head of
personnel at a company. People leave because they don't like
your company. You need to start a partnership early on.
The one comment that was made today, I will just take a
brief moment to mention, is the cost of mariner training. What
I have said to marine employers is, you will spend $6,000 to
$10,000 on an unknown walking in off the street. How about you
give me $1,000 for my ninth graders and get to know them for
four years and build a relationship? That ninth grader is going
to stick with you. That is a much better investment than
throwing money out at unknowns. That is what I think is a big
help.
Mr. LaTourette. I think that is exactly right, and that
goes into what I want to talk to Captain Slesinger about, and
that is apprenticeship programs. Do these 16 institutions that
you have put in your testimony have apprenticeship programs as
part of their curriculum or no?
Captain Slesinger. Some do. One issue that has just come
up, which I mention in my comments, which was unknown to me, I
started working as a mariner with the Corps of Engineers when I
was 16. Apparently in the 1980s, some changes were made in the
labor laws that preclude young people, before the age of 18,
from working in the marine field. This is a particular problem.
I had KC Shipping offer me four full-term internships this
summer for our eleventh graders, and I couldn't get the
students involved because of that. Now, maybe something can be
done to exempt an apprentice program which is structured and
looked at, rather than direct employment. But most juniors are
not going to be 18. And it is a problem that is just starting
to show up.
Mr. LaTourette. Is that a State law or is that a Federal
law?
Captain Slesinger. I believe it is Federal. I am working
with some DOL people on that to get a little more information.
But that just came out of left field for us.
Mr. LaTourette. Captain Slesinger, the apprenticeship
programs that you were describing in your testimony indicated
that their success is really determinative based upon the
company buy-in. And are you finding, because of shortages,
because of new training requirements, are you finding companies
willing to make that buy-in? Are they eager to do that?
Captain Slesinger. Yes. Yes, companies are very eager to do
that. I think their problem is finding the right vehicle to do
it. That is why, in the towing industry, I do not believe that
you could have a successful training program unless you involve
the companies. These are hands-on jobs and you need people to
be out there working with their hands and working on the
vessels. We heard earlier testimony that one of the problems
with the Academy is the lack of ships. There are many, many
tugboats around which could use apprentices and start that
training process. But that is key to their success.
Mr. LaTourette. This reminds me, I have a lot of folks in
the machine business back in Ohio. Most of them are first or
second generation people who came from Eastern Europe, most of
them are 50, 60, up in years. Like you, they are having trouble
attracting young people to make that a career path. Some of the
most successful recruitment efforts that I have seen are based
upon fellows that have apprenticeship programs, teaching them
that it is actually a good career, it can be a rewarding
career.
Ms. Eriksson, there has been a lot of talk today about the
cost of STWC standards, and you mentioned it, some others
mentioned it. I think you mentioned $16,000, I think one of our
earlier witnesses said $20,000, and maybe they put in the room
and board that you said wasn't included in your figure.
I have two questions before I get to your loan proposal.
Have these higher standards resulted in a safer maritime
working environment, in your opinion? Sometimes we make rules
that don't mean much, even when you follow them.
Ms. Eriksson. As an unlicensed mariner in like the basic
safety training, et cetera, I do believe they have made it
safer, especially when I worked for the Alaska Marine Highway
in the steward's department, they never drilled that with fire
and et cetera. So I found that to be highly of value.
I think when you get into the higher levels, I don't know,
because I am not an officer, I am an unlicensed mariner, but
just anecdotally, I think some of it became a little too highly
regulated. But you have to meet the convention.
Mr. LaTourette. Right. And my observation is there is some
basic stuff, we had a hearing on marine safety and we had some
captains in that indicated when they drilled, they had turnout
suits that didn't fit, because somebody got a little chubbier
than they used to be when they first got the suit. So there is
some basic stuff, like CPR and lifesaving, things like that.
But let me talk to you about your loan proposal, because I
am intrigued. I happen to be a big supporter, I think the
Chairman probably is, too, that we do recognize in certain
industries, we have a national interest in promoting employment
in those industries. So we do it, you mentioned teachers, I
think we do it with nurses, we do it with physicians. And it is
to make sure that under-served areas have the opportunity to be
served by health care professionals or teachers, as the case
may be.
I understood what your proposal is. Do you think that it
needs to be for the entire Country or should we target it
towards particular areas that are having difficulty recruiting
and maintaining merchant mariners?
Ms. Eriksson. In my opinion, it should be a national
program, as it would be, then, within MARAD. Because the issues
in Alaska are often the same issues as in Florida or in the
Gulf Coast and Seattle in terms of the coast-wise, and that is
all around the Country, the hawsepipe issue. Though it is
designed to even be usable to somebody who wants to get their
AB and tankerman, which could cost $5,000. So I think, but as a
pilot project, I think you should target geographically the
areas where there is the most need.
Mr. LaTourette. Let me ask you just this $16,000 or $20,000
or whatever it is, is it your experience and observation that
that cost is completely borne by the person who wants to
receive that certification? Or do the companies help?
Ms. Eriksson. Often a company can help or a union can help.
But in terms of like when you are hawsepiping the unlicensed
union doesn't necessarily want to pay for you to become
licensed and vice versa. Also the traditional independence of
mariners, they tend to want to move around. So there are quite
a few mariners that will want to get this on their own, or that
used to get them on their own with a minimum of expense to get
their license and that is all shut down. So you would have to
almost indenture yourself, in a way, to get what you needed.
Mr. LaTourette. And is it your observation, just so I am
clear, that the STWC stuff has taken it from it didn't cost too
much to get your license? Is it all in STWC that takes us up to
the $16,000, $20,000?
Ms. Eriksson. My understanding is that the STWC
certifications requirements for between AB and mate, it is like
flashing lights and stability, et cetera, and GMDSs. I base the
$16,000 on what the Pacific Maritime Institute was charging at
the time.
Mr. LaTourette. Thank you very much. Thank you, Mr.
Chairman.
Mr. Cummings. Just one last question, Ms. Eriksson. Let's
talk about women in the industry. What challenges do we have
with regard to getting women in this industry? I am just
curious.
Ms. Eriksson. From when I started, when it was hell, to
now----
Mr. Cummings. Say that again?
Ms. Eriksson. It was hell in the beginning, in the 1970s.
But the situation has really changed. It is much better. The
academies are turning out really good women officers and stuff.
And something I want to not only in terms of women, I want to
bring up in terms of this meeting is, we have spent a lot of
time talking about officers, where 75 percent of the workforce
is unlicensed.
That is where the challenges were for women in the past,
especially in the engine room. But that is changing a lot. And
some of these programs, like the high school programs, Mar
Vista and others, the girls, high school girls, they are doing
really well. There are girls coming out of those high school
classes, too. It has improved quite a bit. It can get better.
It is not as unpleasant any more. There is a lot more
acceptance.
Mr. Cummings. Thank you all very much. This ends this
hearing.
[Whereupon, at 1:50 p.m., the Committee was adjourned.]
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