Strive for a safe, productive 2008

  • Published
  • By Chief Master Sgt. Michael Williams
  • 60th Air Mobility Wing command chief
TRAVIS AIR FORCE BASE, Calif. --  Happy New Year! I hope each of you had a safe, festive holiday season. Now it's time to role up our sleeves and begin a new year.

2007 was an incredible year for Team Travis, filled with monumental accomplishments and milestones. Yet, immersed in the midst of our distinguished record of success stood nine untimely deaths, 38 preventable DUIs and host of other needless alcohol-related incidents. As remarkable as 2007 was, we as a team can do better in 2008, we must.

It's time for us to refocus and return to the basic principles of being an Airman; our core values. There's no better time than the dawn of a new year to take a retrospective survey to determine areas which may require improvement. In fact, at the beginning of every year, millions of Americans around the world declare a new year's resolution. This declaration is viewed as a personal contract to improve their livelihood or lifestyle. 

Typically most American's New Year's resolutions are to stop smoking, exercise more, further their education, save money, reduce debt, etc.

What was your new year's resolution? Was it to be a better? We need you to be the best Air Force citizen you can be! Martin Luther King Jr. once said, "If a man is called to be a street-sweeper, he should sweep streets even as Michelangelo painted, or Beethoven composed music, or Shakespeare wrote poetry. He should sweep streets so well that all the hosts of heaven and earth will pause to say, here lived a great street-sweeper who did his job well." What will be your legacy as an Airman?

Our leadership team has exhausted countless hours and resources reciting and displaying the expectations of our Airman; making responsible choices, doing the right thing at the right time in the right way, eliminate errors, be an example and be satisfied with nothing short of perfection, etc. Our Core Values: Integrity, Excellence in all We Do and Service Before Self, must be at the heart of every word spoken, every decision made and every action taken.

I don't know what your new year's resolution is, I simply pray it's to make you a better person and that you possess the discipline and commitment to adhere to your contract. Because, at Team Travis we don't want to have any untimely deaths, alcohol-related incidents or eclipse the number of DUIs we experienced in 2007. Share this reading with somebody. I realize you can't reach them all, but those you can, do and those you can't, try.

As always, be safe make responsible choices and I'll see you around campus.