VIETNAM WAR 50TH COMMEMORATION ADVISORY COMMITTEE
REPORT OF MARCH 7, 2017 MEETING IN ARLINGTON, VA
The meeting began at 1:30 pm
and concluded at 3:05 pm, was chaired by Tom Ridge and attended by 8 other
committee members and numerous staff.
This was the 7th meeting of the Advisory Committee and my 5th
and it was held at the office for the project.
The meeting room was smaller and felt crowded. Prior to the meeting I was met by Marcia
Moore, Designated Federal Officer. She
had documents for me and escorted me to the meeting room. She made sure I had a seat from which I could
watch the screen. After Ridge opened the
meeting, she was the first person to speak.
I was the only public person there she explained and she had me stand,
introduce myself. Several people said
welcome and Ridge said “glad you are here.” My name and VPCC was on the printed agenda
seen by all. Moore finished her report
and the meeting was devoted to only one agenda item: Introduction for the Conceptual Plan for
Vietnam War 50th Commemoration’s 2018-2025 Activities.
The powerpoint presentation
was given by Larry Brom, Assistant Director of Plans and Operations. The first thing he said was, “I think you
have a copy of the plan, Mr Provance. Is
that correct?” To which I said
“yes.” So, curiously, there was more
recognition of our attendance at this meeting unlike any other one
previously.
Here I will summarize the
discussion that followed. Originally
their Execution Phase was 2014-2017 (3 years).
They had a lot of activity in the last two years and so they are
extending the Execution Phase one more year until 2018 in order to maximize
their outreach and which is then followed by their Sustainment Phase from
2018-2025. Their main goal is still to
reach out to all military personnel during the Vietnam War era and are doing
that through media/communications and local events. They now have 10,625 Commemorative Partners
which have held 8,288 local events between 2011-2017. They have conducted 323 Oral History
Interviews as of March 1, 2017.
Basically from 2018 to 2023 they are encouraging more local activities
and for some states are promoting state wide coordinated events or a state
level event. Several members and I were
surprised to learn that 28 states currently celebrat March 29 as Vietnam War
Memorial Day. And some history of this
was mentioned but no one was really clear how this got started other than to
hear that Congress knew it did not have the support for a national memorial
day. So events are encouraged on this
date and efforts will be made to get more states to adopt a resolution to
celebrate it. Question here: Does this provide to us some organizing
options? This may also be the date in
2023 when they will organize a national event in DC at the Vietnam War Wall
Memorial. Then they will organize one
more national event during Memorial Day weekend and national event in 2025,
their last project and the year the project will dissolve. For both of these, 2023 and 2025, they will
try to get national figures, representatives from the 5 Allied Countries,
perhaps even the President. They will
try to work and influence the contract of the organization which will be
responsible for the Memorial Day event in 2025, not create their own, get
between 15-30 minutes at it and get introduced Congressional resolution that
will support the event. After that, the
project will issue its report by Sept 30, 2025 as stipulated in the legislation
guiding their work but will leave open possibilities for people to comment on
their website on the May 2025 event and particularly veterans.
The meeting then began to talk
about how to sustain Commemorative Partners and activities from 2018-2023 and
then to 2025. Members spoke of new
partners, new ideas, measuring impact and looking for new opportunities. It was pointed out that Nov 18, 2022 is the
40th anniversary of the Wall and appropriate for local events as
well. They reported that each local
event is averaging about 129 veterans who are honored. They recognize that leadership of local
partners will change between now and 2025, even staff and committee members
might change as well and so there is a constant need for doing education work
for even new people and partners.
They did refer to the
documents that they create as educational materials. In fact, one of their members is speaking
next week in Texas to an organization of retired teachers. This led Mark Franklin to repeat what he
always does and that is “we are not offering lesson plans.” What they did say yesterday was that “we have
resources for the topics and themes that come up.” Still feels like educational plans,
strategies to me as I have said before despite their official pushback that
they are not.
Ridge did offer that he would
expect funds to reduce over the last 8 years as well to which the new director
spelled out some budget details (no figures) and agreed that there would be a
diminution.
If members are invited to
speak, they are encouraged to get in touch with the project office for
resources and materials. The next
meeting will be in September 2017 and Ridge explained that it will be the
occasion to discuss in detail the proposed activities that were presented
today.
I was able to get a notebook
of the formal meeting previous to the public one which includes some fotos from
the new website which will be released in the summer 2017. I am also looking through this booklet from
the official meeting prior to the public one to see if there are other pieces
that are important. There is nothing in
it about the history and timeline which may have been discussed along with
website report but not mentioned in the written materials.
Terry
Provance
March 8,
2017
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