Forum aims to enhance support

  • Published
  • By Senior Airman Charles Rivezzo
  • 60th Air Mobility Wing Public Affaris
TRAVIS AIR FORCE BASE, Calif. --  The sixth annual Caring for People Forum concluded here Nov. 7 at Travis Air Force Base, California, with nearly 40 participants voicing their ideas and concerns across a variety of specialized focus groups.

Utilizing a grass-roots style approach, the program is designed to strengthen support services and ultimately improve quality of life for Airmen and their families. Issues and ideas are relayed to senior leaders through discussion between base-level Community Action Information Boards and Integrated Delivery Systems and their communities.

"What's unique about this forum is that it gives you the opportunity to be the eyes and ears of the commander on issues that I may not be aware of," said Col. Corey Martin, 60th Air Mobility Wing commander, to participants of the forum. "Even with programs I am familiar with, it's never good to just have a single perspective on anything. We want to hear your ideas, address them as best as we can at the wing level and ultimately feed your ideas to Air Mobility Command."

Throughout the day, the diverse focus groups of 5 to 10 people represented issues on deployment support, family support, school support, health and wellness, Reserves support, single Airman support, special needs family members and spouse communication.

From these discussions, more than a dozen issues were raised including an Air Force-wide streamlining of the permanent change of station process for exceptional family members program families, improving the medical referral process, 24-hour food and fitness services and standardizing the pre-deployment preparation time.

Furthermore, more so than simply identifying gaps where improvements are sought, individuals within the focus groups also took a proactive approach toward establishing in-depth solutions to the issues they identified in order to present their information to Air Force leadership.

"I think forums like this bring the real problems to light from the members of our Travis family," said Staff Sgt. Matthew Amerson, 60th Logistics Readiness Squadron fuels information manager. "I facilitated the Family Support Group and ideas and problems were brought up that I would never have thought of.  I find it very important to continue forums like this to help ensure our family is taken care of to the best of our abilities." 

While some issues will be assessed on the local level, those with a larger focus than just Travis will be sent to AMC for review.

"It is essential to have a forum where we can provide our leadership the knowledge of what is taking place down at the grass-roots level of how the Airmen and their family members are impacted by the community and services we are providing," said Wes Yancey, 60th AMW community support coordinator. "That way they are able to exert more pressure and help guide the development of the benefits we are providing."

Yancey added that while certain issues cannot be resolved overnight or even within the immediate future, participation in the forum is also about striving to improve and shape our service for the next generation of Airmen and their families.

"It's about leaving things better than when we found them," he said. "In this case, it's about looking for ways to improve our Air Force and the services and benefits it provides."

For more information on the Caring for People Forum and/or to share ideas, please contact the CSC at 424-7031.