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From: Arild Jensen (no email)
Date: Wed Feb 01 2006 - 22:00:08 EST
My original post was censored because I left in the forbidden word
"Bayliners" in the subject line. Censorship strikes again.
-----Original Message-----
From:Dale Klahn
Ok. So I'm curious as to why anyone in "our" situation would be against
Licenses? I've always wondered "why not?"
REPLY
In Canada we have already gone through the exercise of requiring a
license.
In our case the Coast Guard is the originating authority so the
certification is Federal.
In other words the test, requirements and proof of competence is the
same regardless of where you boat.
The immediate objection is the degree of competence to be safe differs
from a sheltered inland lake to open ocean and coastal waters. How to
establish a fair and common criteria is a real deal breaker.
In our case, the lowest common denominator is set so low as to be
considered ridiculous by some people who have been involved with boating
safety training for a long while. I will admit to being one of those. I
already have my Life membership with the Canadian Power Squadrons after
having taught every single course available, except the Celestial
navigation stuff. I have gone from teaching 20 week long Boating classes
to seeing this reduced to a 10 - 12 week cram course and finally reduced
to an 8 hour quickie crash course on rules of the road, basic safety
equipment and a smattering of regulations.
To me the NASBLAS sanctioned basics for Boats is a joke.
To someone inland who boats on rivers and ponds that has no charts, no
navigation aids, no tides and in many cases, is so shallow you can often
get out and walk ashore, even the basic requirements seem pretty stiff.
Will an inland lake boater accept having to meet coastal water demands?
What buoys? Flares? Who is there to see them? Anchors? Wait half an hour
and you drift ashore on a sand beach.
As a practical consideration, how do you successfully present the
required course and honestly administer many millions of tests in a few
short years. The infrastructure required is considerable. By their own
account Power Squadrons have reached less than 10% of the actual boating
population. The prospect of doubling, let alone tripling the classes, is
pretty daunting to the organization.
If you allow for profit organizations to teach courses and administer
tests, who becomes watch dog to ensure it doesn't become a license to
print money and a rubber stamp certificate mill? It adds yet another
layer of bureaucracy and government inspectors. Fraudulent certification
in all sort of activity fields is already a problem.
This will perhaps be even greater due to the very high number of people
affected.
The very real danger is that a few people honestly get their
certificates but a great many more don't bother at all or else cheat.
Now you have an enforcement issue as well.
Some areas will be heavily patrolled but others will never see a patrol
from one year to the next. Is that fair? If not, what are you going to
do about it?
Depending on who the issuing authority is, you may also get into
jurisdictional disputes and cross recognition of certifications.
I suspect the American public would never tolerate the one license fits
all issued by a federal authority. Not to mention which; each state sees
itself as having supreme authority and resents any federal infringement
on that.
All logic aside, there is a huge can of worms just waiting for someone
to open it.
Cheers
Arild
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