Finally met up with Dennis Bryers, park architect and he is going to be of great benefit to us. We are now working on items noted in the last inspection, that just came to light. By that I mean the inspection had been laying around for 8 months no one seemed to know it actually had to have items looked at and fixed. Most are minor like taking an antenna wire out of the aft escape hatch. Some the city is doing such as putting together a fire alarm system and writing an Emergency Procedures Manual to fit with their rules. The two biggest projects are figuring how to lift up one end of the boat at a time so as to take out some wood that is between the ship and the supports and replacing that with neoprene. Also we will be building a ramp from the port side of the aft escape hatch to the ground as a second fire exit. So plenty for the volunteers to work on.
We are having a meeting next week between officers at Stratcom and Parks and Rec to see how much help they can give us. For sure they want to start lining up volunteers from the active duty types and from those Retired Navy people who work at Stratcom.
I also finally got the park set up as a RSVP site. Anyone wanting info on what it is how to do it and forms needed, let me know. I am busy writing up forms to be used for the volunteers to fit their program and also forms that allow RSVP to advertise for volunteers in several job categories. There are some good benefits to having those over 55 all signed up as RSVP. They give limited mileage reimbursements, free liability insurance and other things.
Dennis is also planning on starting on some grants for the park and the new Director of Parks and Rec is setting up a foundation for all the parks. We will probably have more things to input than most of the parks as we are in the process of defining long term goals and needs. Dennis, like myself, wants to push for a new building to house classrooms for the students that are starting to schedule tours, to be a non-lending library/museum, and space for an office and gift shop. Lots to do to get that to happen, but at least we have people who understand the needs and want it to happen.
So I'll keep all updated as more gets done.
Viejo
