Anonymous - Comments

Why is it that Coast Guard officers are not able to anticpate the coming of Summer boating season. You would think that they teach this at the academy, but yet now the Captain of the Port of New York gets caught snoozing. Apparently by the time he realized that Summer was coming, it was August, so he called all of the people who had submitted requests for fireworks and swim events to find that they were already publicized, many in conjunction with larger events. Now, on August 9, he has to publish an emergency rule, effective on the sixth three days before it was announced, for "enforcement purposes." Although the administrative procedures act allows for such emergencies, it is confounding why Captain Hitchens had to resort to this when most of us have spent snowy months anticipating Summer. Emergency rules deprive the citizens of notice and an opportunity to be heard, they are antithetical to due process, this rule is obviously unenforceable against those who violated it as it is ex post facto. When will the Commandant wake up and weed out these officers who just don't get it?