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a <br />ORANGE COUNTY BOARD OF COMMISSIONERS <br />RESOLUTION SUPPORTING AN ALTERNATIVE METHOD OF <br />RECOGNIZING VETERANS STATUS FOR MERCHANT MARINE SEAMEN <br />FROM WORLD WAR II <br />WHEREAS, Public Laws 95-202 and 105-368 bestowed veteran status on US <br />Merchant Marine Seamen of World War II; and <br />WHEREAS, two specific U.S. government actions have caused some 10,000 <br />merchant seamen to have been denied their due recognition: <br />(1) The United States Coast -Guard relieved Masters of tugs, towboats <br />and seagoing barges of the responsibility for submitting reports of <br />seamen shipped and discharged and <br />(2) The National Maritime Administration ordered ships' logbooks to be <br />destroyed because they were too costly to maintain and removed the <br />two main criteria required by the government to issue official <br />recognition to those seamen; and <br />WHEREAS, the average age of the remaining seamen is over 86 years of age <br />and the US veterans' population is shrinking at an average of 850 per year <br />causing time to be of the essence; and <br />WHEREAS, no costs are associated with this proposal as funds are already <br />included in above public laws; and <br />WHEREAS, the Orange County Board of Commissioners desires that action be <br />taken to address this concern; <br />NOW THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED that we, the Orange County Board of <br />Commissioners, support the attached proposal and forward this Resolution and <br />attached proposal to Senator Kay Hagan, Senator Richard Burr, and <br />Congressman David Price encouraging that this matter addressed. <br />Adopted this 16t" day of June, 2009. <br />Valerie P. Foushee, Chair <br />Orange County Board of Commissioners <br />