The 2007 COMARA REUNION has been scheduled for late afternoon on
Sunday, September 23, 2007 at "THAT'S AMORE" restaurant located at:
15201 Shady Grove Road
Rockville, MD 20850
This location is easily accessed from U.S. I-270. The menu and cost for the reunion will be finalized in August and should be similar to previous reunions. More detail will be provided, but for now,
"Save the Date!"
Your Board of Directors also decided to have the 2007 COMARA Annual meeting at the start of the reunion event. This will allow a greater number of members access to the annual meeting at a convenient time and place. We promise it will be brief.
This is the first COMARA Annual Reunion scheduled in the sovereign state of Maryland, after four annual events in Virginia. We would hope for a great turnout from everyone, but especially those residing in that fine state, birthplace of the current COMARA President (Balto.).
At the suggestion of Joel Alper, long-time Chairman of the National Philharmonic Orchestra, we're sponsoring a "COMARA Night" at a National Philharmonic Orchestra concert in late October at Strathmore, the wonderful new concert hall on Rockville Pike at the Grosvenor metro station (free parking!). It's on Saturday, October 20, at 8 p.m. The program includes the Brahms Second Piano Concerto and, fittingly for COMSAT, Gustav Holst's The Planets. We will also have the use of the Comcast Circles Lounge for our group, both before the concert and at intermission; free snacks, plus a cash bar. Join Us!
Very good orchestra seats are available at only $29, a very substantial reduction. Mail your check for $29 per seat, payable to COMARA, with "Concert" on the Memo Line, to us at COMARA, P.O. Box 34594, Bethesda, Md. 20827. The deadline for receipt is Wednesday, September 19. You pick up your tickets at a special COMARA table near "Will Call" on the day of the event. You will need the ticket to gain admittance to the Comcast Circles Lounge. Try to arrive by at least 7:30 p.m. Questions? Call Jack Hannon at 703-356-2181.
Brij Agrawal:
Paul Schrantz forwarded a press release relating to Brij Agrawal, who worked at COMSAT Labs as far back as 2100 L Street in the mid-1960s (and bought his first car to travel to the Labs when it opened!), then left to support the Aeronautical program in Holland and went on to greatness, as excerpts from the release indicate:
Distinguished Professor of Mechanical and Astronautical Engineering Brij Agrawal has won the prestigious Naval Postgraduate School Richard W. Hamming Faculty Award for Achievement in Interdisciplinary Activities for 2006. The founder and director of the NPS Spacecraft Research and Design Center (SRDC), Agrawal received the honor at the Quarterly Awards Ceremony March 13 in King Hall.
Agrawal founded the SRDC in 1997 and established five state-of-the-art laboratories -- Spacecraft Design, Optical Relay, Spacecraft Attitude Dynamics, Smart Structures and Fleet Satellite Communications. Each lab has unique test beds and tools providing students with hands on experience and experimental research in spacecraft and space systems design, testing, acquisition, fine-pointing control, tracking, jitter control, adaptive optics, remote sensing, high-energy lasers and directed energy.
Based on capabilities currently in use in the space industry, Professor Agrawal developed the NPS Space Systems Concept Development Center (CDC), incorporating all aspects of the multi-disciplinary spacecraft design and development process including program management, systems engineering, test and evaluation and cost analysis. He is currently designing a new NPS High Energy Laser (HEL) Beam Control Laboratory, which will have $9.3 million in state-of-the-art optics equipment.
Rob Briskman:
Rob, a Co-Founder of Sirius and now serving as Technical Executive at the firm, has been awarded the 2007 AIAA Aerospace Communications Award. The award is presented for an outstanding contribution in the field of aerospace communications. He is being honored for his pioneering efforts in developing the Satellite Digital Audio Radio Service (SDARS), know widely today as satellite radio. The award will be presented at the 25th AIAA International Communications Satellite Systems Conference in Seoul, South Korea on April 12, 2007.
Rob's technology development responsibilities at Sirius included design of low cost satellite receiving terminals for cars and of broadcast sound programming, earth station, terrestrial repeaters and satellite control facilities. Rob is a fellow of IEEE and AIAA, has published over 50 technical papers, holds a number of patents, and has been inducted into the Space Foundation and SSPI Halls of Fame.
Mary Ann Elliott:
Mary Ann was elected to the Society of Satellite Professionals International Hall of Fame in 2007. The citation reads:
Mary Ann Elliott, Chairman and CEO of Arrowhead Global Communications, for entrepreneurship in the founding of Arrowhead Global and its growth into a major provider of end-to-end communications solutions to the U.S. Federal government.
Delbert Smith:
Del was also elected to the Society of Satellite Professionals International Hall of Fame in 2007. The citation reads:
Dr. Delbert Smith, Senior Telecommunications Counsel, Jones Day, for his instrumental role in the recovery of the Palapa B2 and Westar VI satellites, which greatly strengthened the satellite insurance industry, and for originating the first satellite communications publication and conference.
Among the other past SSPI Hall of Fame inductees with links to COMSAT are the following: Rob Briskman, Joe Pelton, John Johnson, John Puente, Burt Edelson, Sid Metzger, Bill Pritchard and Joseph Charyk.
Albie Williams:
Albie Williams participated in March at the Senior Indoor Track Meet in Boston, Mass., and came away laden with laurels. He is the "Over 65 Gold Medallist" at 200 meters and the Silver Medallist in the Over 65 category at both 60 meters and 400 meters. Heartiest congratulations, Albie!
Lyn Russell wrote to Lockheed Martin to inquire about whether spousal medical coverage continues where the COMSAT retiree dies first. Here is Lockheed's reply:
Based on the Summary Plan Description effective January 1, 2007, on page 102, states "If you should die...On or after January 1, 1998, ...Your spouse will be covered until his or her death, provided your spouse pays any required contributions."
This is very good news indeed. Thanks, Lyn! Lyn, by the way, is now holding forth from Westminster, Maryland.
For those of you who worked for COMSAT an "appreciable" period of time (see details below) but left before you were eligible to retire, I understand you should have received a "vesting certificate" at the time of your departure, indicating any downstream eligibility to draw a pension. (Of course you may have long since forgotten that you have this document, or worse - you can't find it or never received it, for whatever reason!) Lockheed Martin is also obligated to inform the Social Security Administration of this, and when you turn 65, Social Security is supposed to send you a letter indicating that you may be eligible for a private pension, and telling you what to do to determine this.
Federal law into the 1980s required you to serve for ten years to be eligible for a "private" pension. The "vesting period" was then changed to five years. So for those of you who worked for COMSAT in the 1970s and 1980s, and worked there more than five years but less than ten years, your eligibility for a Lockheed Martin pension will have to be determined by Lockheed Martin on a case-by-case basis. To the best of my information, you will not be eligible to receive this pension until you turn 65. Call the Lockheed Martin Service Center at 1-866-562-2363 to inquire, if you think you may be eligible.
And if you didn't retire from COMSAT, but worked there for more than ten years, in whatever period back to the beginning, it is my understanding, which you will have to verify, that you can take your "full" Lockheed pension at age 62, computed on the basis of number of years of service and highest five salary years. You can elect to take this pension at any time from age 55 on, but at a penalty of six percent per year earlier than age 62. Thus, at age 55, you're eligible for a pension that is 42% lower than at age 62; at age 57, it is 30% lower than at age 62; at age 60 it is 12% lower than at age 62; and so on. Again you can get full information by calling the Lockheed Martin Service Center. (See number, above.)
In either case, a recent Washington Post story says that your former employer is obligated to provide you with a both a written estimate of your pension benefit and a "Summary Plan Description". If you think you may be eligible for a Lockheed Martin pension, call the Service Center, explain your situation, and ask them to confirm your eligibility and send you these two documents. Make sure they know of any change in your address.
A final disclaimer: I have tried to present what I think to be the situation, after consulting such information sources as are available to me. But only Lockheed Martin can confirm or deny your eligibility, so that's where you'll need to inquire.
Jack Hannon.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/03/23/AR2007032302011.html
A recent Washington Post Article that you may still be able to read stressed how vital it is to your children that you have adequate documentation in place relating to management of your assets and, frankly, your medical care, in the event you should become unexpectedly incapacitated. In the case presented in the article, a couple with adult children had none of this documentation, and both became incapacitated in rapid succession, and needed to go to an assisted living facility in one case and a nursing home in the other. The children needed to sell the family home to pay for this care. Only problem is, the older couple had not executed any of the documents the Post suggests, which in turn necessitated lengthy and costly legal proceedings to authorize the children to act for the parents in selling the house
OK, now that I have your attention, here's the document list and the commentary, courtesy of the Post, which is also available here:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/03/23/AR2007032301982.html
Other documents and information you will need:
SOURCES: American Bar Association and AARP
A New York Times front-page story on March 26 indicated that some seniors with long-term care policies are having significant difficulty collecting under those policies when they have to enter a Nursing Home or other Assisted Living facility and need the insurance coverage to pay the bills. The story highlights the track record of several insurers with far above average numbers of complaints, seemingly disclosing a pattern of "waiting out" the final illness of their insureds through, among other things, maintaining a very cumbersome claims process. The table on p. A16 (available online at NYTimes.com for a $4.95 fee; or go to your library) indicates, for example, that the three companies with the highest levels of complaints, as a per cent share of policies underwritten, of the ten companies listed, were far higher than the average. (We are reluctant to name the companies here, for obvious reasons.)
What to do if your policy is with a firm with a higher than average number of complaints, noting that Maryland is one of the states with "large numbers of complaints" identified in the article, is well beyond the scope of COMARA'S services. You may want to get professional advice. But if you're placing a policy now, then before you sign, get the details on the claims processing framework of your proposed insurer, and also ask about the level of complaints they receive on their long-term policies.
Benefits Section compiled by Jack Hannon
Joel Alper:
Joel is the long-time Chairman of the National Philharmonic Orchestra, a large symphony orchestra based at Strathmore. COMARA Members will have the opportunity to hear the National Philharmonic at its regular concert in October, which, fittingly for satellite veterans, will feature Gustav Holst's The Planets. (See Events, above.)
Jerry Breslow:
Jerry, who retired from COMSAT as Vice President, Secretary and Chief Ethics Officer, is now a director and Secretary and Parliamentarian of the Board of Directors of Strathmore Hall Foundation in Bethesda, Md. Strathmore includes the wonderful new performing arts center on Rockville Pike. Jerry, whose work with Hexagon goes back decades, contributed a musical production number to the recent Hexagon revue, STRIKE WHILE THE IRONY'S HOT. He also serves as a director and vice president of Friends of Hexagon, and at Suburban Hospital in Bethesda serves as a member of its Institutional Review Board, a doctor-lay committee that oversees research at that facility. There is certainly much public service here for Jerry in "retirement!"
Bill Byrnes:
On Saturday, February 18, Bill Byrnes, from the International Division in COMSAT's early days, married the former Mary Pat Collins in a ceremony attended by family and friends in the telecom world at St. Luke's Catholic Church, McLean. Their reception was at the Ritz Carlton Hotel, Tysons Corner. Best Man for their wedding was Jack Hannon, a high school classmate of the groom. In March, Bill and Mary Pat had a delayed honeymoon on a Yale University theater trip to London, with commentary each morning on the "play of the day" by a professor from the Yale School of Drama, You will recall that Bill lost his first wife, Cathy, also a COMSAT International Division veteran, to cancer several years ago.
Beatrice Duncan (nee Whittington)(Florida):
Wrote in from Florida to say that she has often wondered what happened to some of her fellow employees and enjoys reading about them in the COMARA Newsletters. Beatrice worked for COMSAT for more than twenty years, and when she left Lockheed in 2002, she move to Florida and married her junior high school sweetheart. How's that for "new beginnings?" Congratulations, Beatrice!
Elsie McGrady:
Worked in the Facilities Dept. at the Labs, and wrote in to indicate that she tries to keep in touch with several fellow COMSAT Labs staff. She's kept busy with seven grandchildren and six great-grandchildren. Congratulations to you too, Elsie! On March 31, she marked 19 years in retirement.
Eric Novotny:
Last October Eric journeyed to Azerbaijan to speak on a national conference on transition to the information economy.
Jack Oslund:
Jack and his daughter Cheryl took a trip through Israel last summer. They arrived the day before new trouble in Gaza began, and left a few days before the 34-day war with Hezbollah in Lebanon began.
Fred Osugi (California):
Fred is well and still living in Los Altos, California. He consults for many of the customers buying satellites from Loral and with some customers buying satellites from Lockheed in Sunnyvale.
Tom Patterson:
Tom is another Labs veteran who started at 2100 L Street. He reports that daughter Laura has now earned her Master's degree in Conservation Biology, doing fieldwork on pond turtles. And son Jim is getting heavily into underwater photography. His close encounter with a humpback whale can be seen at www.jimpattersonphotography.com; click on "Dive Log," then on "10/01/06 South Monastery" to see the two photos.
Ernie Robertson (California):
Ernie is "retired" and "recovered" from his health difficulties, but still consults with Loral for about a day a week. He and his wife, former secretary to Arnold Berman (Labs), plan trips to Russia in June and Sicily in October. Ernie is a fountain of contacts with and bulletins about former colleagues: Paul Schrantz and Ellen Hoff at the W.L. Pritchard firm; Bob Strauss and Paul Schrantz when in California consulting for Rob Briskman at Sirius; Arnold Berman, in California in late 2006, consulting for Terrastar; and Larry Westerlund, consulting with space insurance underwriters. Ernie says that Larry, when not consulting, lives on a boat with his wife in the Caribbean.
Henry Suyderhoud (Florida):
Henry has organized a Science Club in his community in Naples, Florida, where they have speakers (including Henry, of course! Who more qualified?) and then a general discussion of the topic. He is tutoring high school and college students in math and statistics, is on the Board of his homeowners association, and runs a community TV Blog. In his spare time, Henry also plays tennis and swims, weather permitting. Henry swears he does a lot of nothing, too, but it's a little hard to see where the nothing time comes from, given all the other activities he has identified to us!
Dan Swearingen:
Dan's trombone can be heard as he performs with the National Concert Band of America and the McLean Symphony, which generally plays its concerts at McLean High School.
Please send us information about what you're doing for a future COMARA Newsletter! Best wishes for the spring and summer!
The COMARA Board of Directors