The National Association of Maritime Organizations (NAMO) meet with high ranking members of U.S. Customs and Border Protection at their headquarters in Washington, DC on June 14, 2018.
The undersigned serves as a Vice President representing the Gulf of Mexico for NAMO and participated in this meeting originally scheduled to engage with the newly appointed Commissioner of CBP Mr. Kevin K. McAleenan.
Unfortunately, Commissioner McAleenan was unable to participate, as he understandably had to attend the funeral service for a fallen CBP officer, that lost his life in the line of duty prior to this meeting.
NAMO was promised a follow up meeting with the Commissioner at a later date.
The meeting was still beneficial offering active engagement with leaders representing Customs and Border Protection.
CBP Participants
- Todd Owen, Executive Assistant Commissioner, OFO (Former Port Director of CBP New Orleans)
- Bradley Hayes, Executive Director, Office of Trade Relations
- Deborah Augustin, Executive Director, Trade Transformation Office, Office of Trade
- Todd Hoffman, Executive Director, Office of Field Operations
- Thomas Overacker, Executive Director, Office of Field Operations
- Sherri Jordan, Acting Executive Director, Office of Finance
- Tina Ghilady, Director, Office of Finance
- M. Schreffler, F. Constant-Gibson, Liaisons, Office of Trade Relations
NAMO Participants
- Niels Aalund
- Jeanne Cardona
- Sean Duffy
- Lisa Himber
- Jason Kelly
- Nate Morgan
- Dennis Rochford
- Tom Sullivan
- David White
The Action Items as developed by the NAMO membership are listed below:
ACTION ITEMS:
- Focus of Ocean Carrier Automation Initiatives – Agreement to convene a small working group to explore NAMO white paper recommendations and others. Including limiting portal usage to U.S. based agents.
- Streamline and Standardize Crew Processing – No action item but CBP HQ will remain open to discretely addressing concerns not adequately resolved at the local port level. Challenges on properly addressing lightering crew and reported increases of deserters and absconder nationally were discussed.
- Simplify Overtime Billing
- Sherri Jordan will explore with NAMO whether the improvements made to Agricultural Inspection overtime billing can be replicated.
- Tina Ghiladi – There is legislation before Congress that NAMO might consider supporting. Bradley Hayes will provide NAMO with the bill title and number.
- Minimize the Effects of Insufficient Staffing
- Todd Owen – There is legislation before Congress that would waive polygraph requirements for transitioning military and law enforcement that NAMO might consider supporting. Bradley Hayes will provide NAMO with the bill title and number.
- NAMO will encourage greater industry promotion of the Veterans Hiring Initiative that simply allows Honorably Discharged Veterans to bypass additional polygraph testing in certain cases. Mr. Owen believed this initiative would help CBP hiring qualified veterans quicker and promoted that CBP welcomes veteran hires.
The Agenda and developed White Papers on the listed Action Items are attached in order.
NAMO White Paper Automation.docx
