He talked to me for some time about their efforts to locate the relevant
documents and responsible parties at various government agencies. Lee is
himself a civilian employee of the Dept of the Army and knows his way
around. I found him to be very straightforward and sincere in his desire
to improve the situation for vehicle owners. In my opinion, Lee is not the
problem.
He described his many phone calls and letters to various agencies and the
very slow response. He also found that stolen vehicles are investigated
by a number of different agencies, depending on jurisdiction. Rules and
Regs are also not centralized with variations among the agencies who might
be holding vehicles in inventory and then dispose of them.
MVPA will try to do a few things for us:
1. Will issue information about how to make sure a vehicle you own or
would like to buy has proper papers.
2. Will attempt to influence the fate of the few remaining M151A2s in DOD
hands. I made clear that saving even a small number of these (rumored to
be about 200 still around) would be a victory for collectors.
3. Will support efforts to change the policy of DOT regarding the
roadworthyness of the HMMWV and M151A2.
I asked Lee if this information could be directly put onto the mil-veh list
from MVPA. Lee seems to rely on Jerry Cleveland for that; we have seen
what Jerry has to say and I don't think it reflects very well the spirit
and effort being made by Lee Holland.
After talking to Lee, I no longer think MVPA has a policy of keeping
secrets. They are just limited in what they can do given the type of
organization they are (small budget, small staff etc). On the other hand,
while I think Lee is doing all he can, putting in a lot of volunteer hours,
I still think an effort aimed at elected officials (Congress) could be
effective if done right. It would have to be a mass movement, however,
with people from a number of states involved. Is there enough of a team
on this list to work on such a project? I would be willing to draft
papers to be used in such an effort, but there has to be troops willing to
put their time and their name into this from their state. Any volunteers?
If anyone wants to talk directly to Lee, his contact information is listed
in Supply Line.
chuck