AmCan to give recruiters the thumb's up

Proclamation to say city is military-friendly

By KERANA TODOROV
Register Staff Writer

The majority of the American Canyon City Council on Tuesday seemed receptive to a proclamation drafted by Councilman Ed West to make American Canyon a military recruiter-friendly zone.

West’s effort is meant to thank military recruiters for providing career opportunities to young men and women whose work, he said, is essential to maintain an all-volunteer military. The proclamation could be read publicly at its next meeting Dec. 2.

On Tuesday, West said the proclamation will not offer military recruiters free space at the city’s expense or any other advantage. The proclamation simply will say, “You’re welcome here,’” West said Tuesday. “This is a safe area.”

“It’s a political statement that needs to be made here,” West said recently. He noted that American Canyon, with its ties to the now-closed Mare Island Naval Base in Vallejo, has a rich military heritage.

“If recruitment does not provide the young men and women needed to replace the hundreds that leave the military every day, then eventually a volunteer military will fail and there will be a military draft,” West wrote in a memorandum Nov. 8.

West’s eldest son, Phillip, was a U.S. Marine who was killed in combat in Iraq in 2004. West’s daughter, Megan, signed up with the Army and entered boot camp this week.

The recruiters who have dealt with his children over the years applied no pressure to join, West stressed Tuesday, noting that another son considered the U.S. Coast Guard but decided to attend Napa Valley College instead.

Vice Mayor Cindy Coffey, Mayor Leon Garcia, who has a son in the U.S. Navy, and City Councilman Don Callison, who served with the U.S. Navy in the early 1980s, also spoke in support of the proclamation.

City Councilwoman Joan Bennett, who questioned the process on how the city issues proclamations, said she would not advocate for the presence of military recruiters on school property.

But Callison, who said he went to college thanks to the military’s educational benefits, said high school students should be aware of what military recruiters have to offer.

Coffey said military recruiters will have tables at the job fair at Donaldson Way Elementary School.

Carl Hilts, a civilian public affairs assistant for the U.S. Army’s Sacramento Recruiting Battalion, which supports almost 50 recruiting stations in Northern California, southern Oregon and western Nevada, said last week the proposed proclamation could help with the military’s image, though it might not directly affect recruiting numbers.

“We would be very happy to support American Canyon in any way that we’re able to,” Hilts said Friday.

Other cities, including Berkeley and San Francisco, have passed proclamations against military recruitment. Two Northern California towns, Arcata and Eureka, on Nov. 4 passed recruitment bans of teens under 18.

The Department of Defense announced Nov. 10 that all four military branches — Army, Navy, Marine Corps and Air Force — met recruiting goals for October.

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