In this AOR any vessel on a city controlled mooring must have an annual VE. My powerboat racing association requires an annual VE. Since VEs are down, why don't we pursue other avenues
for performing VEs?

I'm not sure that VEs are down in recent years (over the long-run, yes). Last time I looked we'd actually had an increase over a few years ago, though they were about stable.

Are you suggesting that we promote that other organizations require VEs?

quote:

Originally posted by RiverAux:
I'm not sure that VEs are down in recent years (over the long-run, yes). Last time I looked we'd actually had an increase over a few years ago, though they were about stable.

From a low of 95k in 02, to 125K in 08. Looks like some dedicated VEs are doing more. Think about all the boats out there and only 125K CMEs done I did not go back to the Auxmis records to find the high point.
In some states the Wildlife and other Agencies do a state inspection and give a sticker

The mandatory VEs I mentioned are all performed by the United States Coast Guard Auxiliary.

I've thought along similar lines before but I just can't decide if it is a good idea or not. First, if you're going to talk another organization into making it one of their rules, their membership needs to be pretty overwhelmingly on board with the idea or it will be a public relations disaster. Second, you definetely need to make sure you've got some sort of reasonable system set up (and enough VEs) to be able to hold up our end.

Now, I have definetely done a lot of outreach to various organizations in the past to get them to promote the program to their members, but haven't had a big response.

Always thought that getting the boats in the big bass fishing tournaments to participate might be a good idea, but probably 75% or more will fail because of improper registration number format (they all like the fancy lettering which isn't legal).

It was an easy sell to the city as they considered the mandatory VEs as just another tool to get rid of unseaworthy scows moored on city owned buoys. Selling mandatory VEs to powerboat and sail racing associations in a bluewater environment was just as easy. Having competition vessels up to snuff, safety-wise, makes a lot of sense to the race organizers who are responsible for the well-being of vessels and crews. We got nowhere with the sponsors of fishing tournaments. I guess fishermen just don't give hoot.

I suppose I just get a little quesy about asking a group to make it mandatory, since this is supposed to be a voluntary program. Sure, we wouldn't be the ones making them do it, but I'm not sure it would do much to engender good feelings towads the Aux.

By the way, does the city require that the people PASS the VSC in order to dock there?

Passing the VE is mandatory to stay on the city mooring buoy. In order to be inspected, the vessels have to come to the VE dock provided by the city to get inspected. That in itself, got rid of a number of scows that were inoperable.
Since the mooring buoys are highly desireable, it behooves the boat owners to pass the VE annually.

I don't recall what year but a Lady Bassmaster Tourney in KY Lake required that all boats have a VE sticker.