Auxiliarist Kirk Scarborough (center) giving presentation to crew members.

“Auxiliary Public Affairs should be everyone’s responsibility,” says Kirk Scarborough, author of this article..  Since we wear Coast Guard uniforms, the public and the press might expect any Auxiliary member to be ready to address the media.  Scarborough is a regular crewmember on the Auxiliary vessel “Fisherman,” owned and operated by Coxswain Don Vary, Flotilla 25 out of Newport Harbor, CA. 

Kirk received permission from Auxiliarist Vary to give the crew a brief twenty minute slide presentation on “Why Auxiliary Public Affairs is Everyone’s Responsibility,” especially crew & coxswain.

There is a good possibility that a Auxiliary vessel maybe the “first on the scene” at an accident on the water and the crew may be confronted by the press when they return to dockside.  Crew members need to know some basic knowledge of what the press will want to know: who, what, where, when, why and how. 

Scarborough explained “one slip of incorrect information could become someone’s nightmare”.

The presentation was done using a lap top computer just before Auxiliarist Vary began his extensive pre-patrol briefing to the crew.  The crew members of the “Fisherman” agreed that the presentation was informative and gave them a better insight of how to deal with the press, should the occasion arise.

Scarborough said, “I hope other Auxiliary crew members will embrace this concept of on the water training.”

~GJA