Norton Introduces Bill to Name New Coast Guard Headquarters after WW II Medal of Honor Recipient

WASHINGTON, DC – Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC) introduced a bill today to name the new U.S. Coast Guard Headquarters on the St. Elizabeths West Campus the "Douglas A. Munro Coast Guard Headquarters Building," for Signalman First Class Munroe, the Coast Guard's only Medal of Honor recipient, who died heroically during a volunteer assignment in World War II. Norton wants to get the bill through the Congress in time for the August opening of the Coast Guard building in the District of Columbia's Ward 8.

"Naming the building for Douglas Munro, as the Coast Guard desires, honors the Coast Guard's only Medal of Honor recipient and the Coast Guard alike," said Norton. "A hero's name belongs on the new state-of-the-art Coast Guard building, the first the Coast Guard has ever owned."

For the last several years, Norton has helped to secure funding for the 1.1-million-square-foot Coast Guard headquarters on the St. Elizabeths West Campus, to house 3,700 Coast Guard civilian and military employees. For the fiscal year 2014 budget, Norton successfully urged the President to include $367,031,000 for continued construction of the consolidated Department of Homeland Security (DHS) headquarters on the West Campus, indicating the Administration's ongoing support of the complex of several buildings and its recognition of the long-term cost savings that come from consolidating agencies and moving them from leased office space into federally owned space. Also included in the President's fiscal year 2014 budget is Norton's request for $9.8 million for D.C. to jumpstart redevelopment of the St. Elizabeths East Campus, where one of the DHS buildings is to be located, a valuable anchor for the D.C.-owned side of St. Elizabeths. These funds ratify Norton's promise to the District and Ward 8 that despite a slower funding pace resulting from the recession, the DHS headquarters will be completed, marking the first time the federal government will locate a federal agency east of the Anacostia River. The DHS headquarters is expected to reinvigorate Martin Luther King, Jr. Avenue, Ward 8's major commercial street.

Published: July 8, 2013