Chris Manthos serves as executive director of the American Watercraft Association. When not riding, he dedicates his time to educating regulators and other officials on the realities of personal watercraft, in contrast to the fantasy world of the no-access crowd. He mows his own lawn, washes his own truck, served his country, pays his taxes, picks up trash on public roads, opens his own beer bottles, reads books, hunts, feeds his own dogs, doesn’t need government to tell him right from wrong, and deplores sanctimonious hypocrites, bullies, and know-it-alls, particularly the political kind.

Wiley Russell Jr. is the dealer coordinator of the AWA and works closely with personal watercraft dealers nationwide, promoting PWC access for all enthusiasts, as well as promoting dealerships. He is a Virginia native and enjoys riding PWC as much as possible.

John Donaldson is not the longest serving PWC government relations guy, but he’s close. He had been in the power sports industry for over a decade when his then employer decided his gift for gab and ability to write completely confusing letters were a perfect match for dealing with politicians and legislators. Since the course change in his work history, Donaldson has worked for two of the biggest PWC manufacturers as well as having a turn at running the Personal Watercraft Industry Association. Donaldson says that these government relations experiences have helped him understand that it sure isn’t the government one learns about in a text book. Further in Donaldson’s past was his service in the U.S. Coast Guard and a few years as owner of a major power sports dealership in Southern California. This diversity of government, manufacturer, and retail experience qualifies Donaldson to help keep AWA members and others informed on the latest activities of government impact on the use of PWC in the PWC Nation.

<<	February 2012					>>
S	M	T	W	T	F	S
			1	2	3	4
5	6	7	8	9	10	11
12	13	14	15	16	17	18
19	20	21	22	23	24	25
26	27	28	29

Monthly Archives

Most recent entries

Syndicate

Atom
RSS 2.0

Wednesday, October 10, 2007

Ballast water, Boxer and Baloney
posted by John Donaldson

Let’s kick off my first ever blogging experience with a writing device, an alliteration. You probably didn’t expect to be reading on the AWA web site and get writing composition lessons.

Oh, and yes, I had to look up both the meaning AND spelling of alliteration. But enough about me.

Ballast water, Boxer and baloney. A good one, right? Well these 3 B’s are all about Washington, D.C., one of the easiest targets in the world to pick on. Yet if we look away from D.C. for just a minute, the folks there might change that baloney into a knife and do very bad things to folks outside of D.C.

Ballast water: You may have seen the ballast water stories elsewhere on this site or in RIDE or other boating publications. The short version is that it is very possible that every recreational boat owner in the country could be required to get a permit – in addition to state registration – to operate their boat. And you have to know that permits mean $$. From here on it gets a bit technical.

Boxer: One of the proposed ways to fix this ballast water issue is to pass a federal law that exempts recreational boaters from the requirement of obtaining a permit.

“Both [Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.), chair of the Senate Environmental and Public Works Committee, and Sen. Bill Nelson (D-Fla.)] spoke out strongly against the notion of permits for boaters and announced they will work together to fix the issue this year with legislation passed in Congress to protect the recreational boating industry and boaters across the country.”

At least according to the National Marine Manufacturer’s Association in its Oct. 5 newsletter.

Baloney: Of course this all leads us to the final part of the alliteration. Almost everything one hears from Washington is really about baloney, something whose contents are a mystery. Boaters would absolutely love to take Senator Boxer at her word, but after all, it’s Washington, and it’s politics.

Elsewhere either on this site or in Ride PWC magazine you will have exhortations to contact your elected representatives in Washington to have them join this fight for a fix on the ballast water issue. Sounds like a good idea to me.

Comments: 0
Trackbacks: 368