At the end of the second millennium, another link was forged in the continuing saga of electronic charting. The assistant commandants for Systems, Operations, and Marine Safety and Environmental Protection chartered a guidance team for electronic charting (ECGT). The focus of this group is to develop a harmonized Coast Guard approach to the issues of electronic charting whether they are internal to the agency, national, or international in scope. Landmark action taken by the ECGT in its first few sessions have been:

• Development of a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between the Coast Guard and NOAA that covers both the purchasing and sharing of S-57 chart data. This MOU is a significant first step toward harmonizing the past, present, and future goals of NOAA and the Coast Guard to achieve S-57 chart coverage of U.S. waters while keeping the life-cycle costs--chart development and maintenance--to a minimum for the Coast Guard and NOAA.

• Creation of working groups to improve the Coast Guard's process for providing ATONIS data to NOAA and to develop and improve training for electronic chart systems that have been or will be fielded in the Coast Guard.

• Issuance of a change to the Code of Federal Regulations (CFR) that exempts certain public vessels from the requirement to carry paper charts.

Persons desiring more information on the activities of the ECGT should feel free to contact Eugene Diotalevi at (703) 313-5847.