[Congressional Record Volume 154, Number 70 (Wednesday, April 30, 2008)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E772-E773]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
TRIBUTE TO MR. ALAN S. WEYMAN
______
HON. CHRIS VAN HOLLEN
of maryland
in the house of representatives
Wednesday, April 30, 2008
Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Madam Speaker, I rise today to recognize an
outstanding public servant, Alan S. Weyman, as he completes more than
39 years of continuous service within the civilian leadership of the
Department of Defense. He began his public service life in naval
shipbuilding in 1969 as an engineer in training in the New Construction
Program Office for the USS Virginia Class Cruiser and is ending it as
NAVSEA's Executive Director for Surface Warfare. Throughout his career,
he worked tirelessly to serve America and our Navy.
Mr. Weyman joined NAVSEA in 1979 as Assistant Program Manager for New
Construction. In 1987 he was appointed to the Senior Executive Service
and assigned as the Deputy in the Gas Turbine Combatant Ship Program
Office where he shared responsibility for fleet support and
modernization of all non-Aegis gas turbine ships, acquisition of FFG 7
Class ships, and execution of the Australian and Taiwanese foreign
military sales programs.
He was designated as Director of Corporate Operations at NAVSEA in
June 1995. While in this position, Mr. Weyman successfully led the
organization through a continuing downsizing and restructuring of
monumental proportions. Under his leadership, the organization reduced
by 45 percent to meet downsizing workforce goals, with minimal mission
impact and involuntary separations. Mr. Weyman was a natural leader in
this Navy initiative, educating the organization and developing actions
to meet a major budget reduction of $1 billion over 5 years. Through
his determination, Mr. Weyman developed a plan to eliminate any
negative impact on the fleet, core equities, or mission organizational
objectives. The process he developed has been adopted as the standard
for the Navy.
In 1999, Mr. Weyman was assigned to the Assistant Secretary of the
Navy (R,D&A) as the Executive Director for the Program Executive
Officer for Theater Surface Combatants which consisted of nearly 400
managers, engineers, logisticians, and financial managers. He was
directly responsible to the PEO for the development and execution of a
wide variety of Navy programs, including Arleigh Burke Destroyer Class
shipbuilding, Navy Area and Theater Wide Ballistic Missile Defense, the
AEGIS program, and life cycle fleet support of the 115 surface ship
combatant fleet.
As Executive Director, New Construction-Current Ship Fleet Support
and Inactive Ships, he was instrumental in the successful restructuring
of the PEO organization, phasing out PEO Theater Surface Combatants,
primarily responsible for the Aegis Shipbuilding Program, and standing
up a new organization, PEO Ships, that is responsible for all surface
ship shipbuilding and modernization. He initiated an integrated Fleet
Support Group for all surface ships and executed that structure within
the Commander Fleet Forces Command SHIPMAIN initiative.
Mr. Weyman has far exceeded expected results of his duties as
Executive Director for In-
[[Page E773]]
Service Ships. He was instrumental in the successful operations of the
PEO, primarily responsible for the in-service support for all surface
ships, including destroyer and cruiser modernization programs, the
ships inactivation program and the FMS Ship Transfer Program. Under his
leadership, the In-Service Ship Team was the horsepower behind the
SHIPMAIN Modernization Initiative, CFT 4 which prioritized alterations
across classes of ships, removed non-valve alterations with a savings
to the navy of over $500M, and instituted a drum beat for alteration
accomplishment. He supported SHIPMAIN CFT's 1, 2 and 3, and the
development of the Surface Warfare Enterprise. He achieved success in
the implementation of a Multi-Ship Multi-Option contract approach for
all surface ships maintenance and modernization. MSMO contracts have
stabilized the repair industrial base and reduced costs to the fleet
OM&N accounts. The achieved successes in the re-activation of the ex-
Kidd Class destroyers for the Taiwanese Ship Transfer program were
extremely impressive; four ships were re-activated for the Taiwanese
Navy several months early and tens of millions under budget. Planning
for follow-on ship transfer work for the MHC's, ex-Trenton, and ex-
Coronado are already in place. The ship Inactivation Programs still
continues to make great strides in reducing the size of the inactive
fleet through the development of innovative processes and continuous
improvements of existing methods.
Mr. Weyman's visionary approach to challenges allows for the
transformation from a ``business as usual'' mentality into actions that
permit innovative improvements in the way the Government and its
private industry partners achieve best value products and services. It
is, therefore, a pleasure to recognize Mr. Alan S. Weyman for his many
contributions in a life devoted to our Nation's security as he leaves
the Department of the Navy. I know my colleagues join me in wishing him
and his wife Barbara much happiness and fair winds and following seas
as they begin a new chapter in their lives.
____________________