For the members of the US Coast Guard Auxiliary to advance, to move forward, to reach and exceed our goals, we must enable technology. Enabling technology lays the foundation for sustained improvement.
Some recent areas in which we’ve enabled technology to assist, improve and enhance the Auxiliary experience for our members are AuxLMS Learning, The Deckplate Leadership Videos, Communities of Interest, and The upcoming Auxiliary YouTube videos.
Most recently, the Coast Guard Mobile app was released. It features safe boating information, safety equipment checklist, VSC requests, the Nav Rules, Float plans, calling features to report suspicious activity or pollution issues and with location services enable, an emergency assistance button which contacts the closest Coast Guard Command Center.
The app was launched on May 16t in conjunction with the start of National Safe Boat Week. It has direct ties to the US Coast Guard Auxiliary. Julian Romero, a 20 year-old Auxiliarist from San Juan, Puerto Rico, who had aspirations of someday enlisting in the Coast Guard or joining law enforcement was taking his girlfriend to a tourist area of San Juan for a dinner to celebrate his twentieth birthday, when they were attacked by a knife wielding robber. When the assailant began to attack Julian’s girlfriend, the Auxiliarist did all that he could to fight off the attack. As a result, Julian was stabbed several times and mortally wounded.
Luis Romero, Julian’s father, who is an entrepreneur in the telecommunications industry, along with his Foundation began to develop a crime fighting app to assist law enforcement. The app “BastaYa” is Spanish for “That’s enough” something Julian was often heard to say when describing crime in Puerto Rico. The app has already been used nearly 7000 times to assist law enforcement.
Luis wanted to do more to honor Julian’s legacy. He wanted to do something for his son’s other passion the Coast Guard and Coast Guard Auxiliary. In July of 2012, Luis traveled to Washington, DC, where he met with the Chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee and members of the Coast Guard and offered to develop and donate an app similar to BastaYa to help boaters.
The logistics involved in the creation and donation of the app were significant, but Luis and his foundation BastaYaPR Inc. were committed to developing the app at no cost and maintaining it, including updates at no cost, for the entire lifespan of the app. It will prove to be a great PE tool, is free to download from iTunes or the Play Store. It loads quickly and easily, as I learned watching Sector Commander, SECLIS, Captain Ed Cubanski load it onto my phone in moments.
The app and all those who will benefit from it will further Julian’s memory as well as his commitment to public service.
Respectfully,
Gus Formato
Gus Formato
District Chief of Staff, First District Southern Region
District Chief of Staff's Message
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