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 News from Around Banderas Bay | May 2008 
Navy League Reaches Out
 Peter Gray - PVNN
| | The USCG Aspen provided the workforce to paint the Bucerias Bilingual Community Center on May 10th. | | |
After organizing visiting sailors from U.S. ships to assist in supporting a number of needy cases in Puerto Vallarta since January, the Navy League extended its painting and maintenance activities to Bucerias this month. The USCG Aspen provided the workforce to paint the Bucerias Bilingual Community Center on May 10th.
This non-profit community center is providing classes in English and Spanish as well as computer skills for 70 students as well as adult classes in the evening. It is thus making a very positive contribution to raising educational levels throughout the Bucerias community.
Perhaps the best way to communicate the spirit of the community relations projects that take place here through the cooperation of the U.S. Navy and the local Navy League, is to quote from a letter that Vice-President Bill Clark sent to the officers and crew of the Aspen. Bill wrote:
Please convey my many thanks to the Captain and volunteers of the USCG Aspen for the painting at the Bucerias Bilingual Community Center. All of you did a fantastic job and as you could see many people in the community came to see the work and meet the volunteers.
One big opportunity was the Municipal official, who upon seeing the work and support the volunteers of the Aspen had provided, agreed to pave the street in front of the center, thus decreasing the dust that is destroying the computer equipment.
Another official agreed to get the community involved in more programs at the Center. One of these programs will be presentations by professional women to teenage girls in the community, addressing how they can become professionals: also leadership with emphasis on the life changes of becoming pregnant and early marriage. The Navy League has agreed to ask three of its members to provide these presentations.
Also active in the Bucerias community is the Amigos organization that supports non-profit organizations including ongoing support for this Center. I am sure that there will be many more opportunities for the Center as a result of the Navy comrel and your support.
These are things that make the contributions of time and effort from volunteers like the USCG Aspen so important to the communities they visit. We all thank you very much for your help and support and look forward to your next visit to Puerto Vallarta.
The Navy League has also committed to help facilitate the shipment and receipt of fifty boxes of books on learning the English language that are presently in Canada. They will be shipped to the Navy League warehouse in San Diego for onward delivery by a U.S. Navy or Coast Guard ship heading for Puerto Vallarta.
Bill Clark's letter typifies the way the Puerto Vallarta Navy League is dedicated to activities that not only bring immediate help to an institution but also create a ripple effect throughout the community, There is so much to be done. To use a nautical phrase - we need all hands to the pump!
The USCG Aspen is officially classed as a Seagoing Buoy Tender. Its duties include oil-spill recovery, search and rescue, homeland security and some ice-breaking operations - as well as tending to navigational buoys.
In January 2008, Mike Rowe, who has a television program in the States in which he volunteers for the world's worst "Dirty Jobs" worked aboard the Aspen on a buoy maintenance shift. It is a pity he was not with the crew that worked in Bucerias. For a change, instead of the worst, he might have experienced one of the "Best Jobs" in the world. |
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