Public Affairs Officer of the Year

Capt. Roman Vitanza of the Texas Wing has been named Civil Air Patrol's Col. Robert V. “Bud” Payton Public Affairs Officer of the Year for 2024. This prestigious award recognizes Vitanza's exceptional contributions to raising awareness of CAP's vital programs across the nation. His dedication to public affairs has significantly enhanced CAP's visibility in Texas and beyond. Through his efforts, the community has gained a deeper understanding of CAP's lifesaving work in emergency services, aerospace education, and cadet programs. He also is a member of the Marketing and Strategic Communications team's national volunteer staff, serving as national brand manager.

Balsem Awards Deadline

You can’t win if you don’t enter. That’s certainly true for the annual Balsem Awards competition, in which any members with a public affairs officer duty assignment below the national level can submit their best work from 2023 for national recognition. The deadline for entries is this coming Sunday, June 30. This link connects you to more details about the contest and how to apply and also offers two important, last-minute reminders for entering your work.

New Recruiting Resources

This is a reminder the MAC team's Brand Portal just got an upgrade with a treasure trove of brand-new recruiting resources guaranteed to make your booth or open house a success. Please note some additional recruiting materials are now available on the portal. One of our most recommended items for recruiting, which can be used in lieu of CAP's suite of recruiting brochures, is the portal's recruiting card (front side, pictured). It's a quick and affordable alternative to the brochures, which are available to commanders, recruiting officers, and public affairs officers through eServices but each CAP unit is limited to just two sets of the brochures per quarter.

Paper Airplane with Lesson

You can also download and print the Aerospace Education team's paper airplane with lesson at this link on the AEO Resources page and the AE Educational Products page. These can be ordered (25 per pack) on eServices in Logistics/Materials Orders/AE Materials. 

Brand Elements Quiz

Logo. Emblem. Seal. Which should you use? Let's start with a quick test of your knowledge of using various Civil Air Patrol graphic elements. Which graphic element on the right is the correct one for each use on the left:

Go to this link to find the answers to our quiz and to learn more about CAP's updated graphics (pictured below).

Wing Website Unification

Congratulations to the Indiana Wing web team — their updated wing website was recently pushed live. Several other wings are nearing completion of their updates, with a total of 31 wings started or completed. If your wing hasn't requested that your current website be copied so you can begin work, or you have questions, please reach out to MAC at capwebsites@capnhq.gov. We can work with you on getting an extension to complete the work — our original timeline was to have websites live in July.

Personally Identifiable Information Standards

A reminder on CAP/IT Personally Identifiable Information Standards: CAP/IT requires, IAW CAPR 1-2 and CAPR 120-1, that no personally identifiable information be listed on Civil Air Patrol websites. This includes emails, cellphone or home phone numbers, internal reports with such data, etc. Websites should list a generic contact email only, such as info@wing.cap.gov, or use an information-gathering form. Either method should route inquiries to the wing’s public affairs officer. Failure to comply with these requirements will lead to CAP IT temporarily disabling the respective page until corrections are made. For any questions about these requirements, please contact the CAP IT Security Manager at capsec@capnhq.gov.

More Website Project Details

If you would like more details on the wing website unification project, information is listed on the CAP Websites page on GoCivilAirPatrol.com. This page includes links to the directions to make updates to your website(s) in SiteViz, several tutorials, and also FAQs for the project.

Brand Compliance

The Brand Management team meets online biweekly to assist members and staff with brand compliance. If you have a brand-related question, can’t find what you need on the Brand Portal, have a request for something new, or need a review of an item you created, simply email the brand team.

July 2024     |     Vol. 2     |     No. 6