Dear Legionnaires

History has been made on September 1st in Minneapolis, Minnesota. After years of hard work and the campaign effort of the past two years, our long time Adjutant Fang A. Wong was unanimously elected by the delegates attending the 93rd National Convention to the high office of National Commander of the American Legion. He is the first National Commander from the Department of New York in over 30 years and the first Chinese-American Veteran to lead the Nation´s largest Veterans organization ever. Congratulations Fang! We are all proud of your accomplishment and look forward to an exciting year and to your leadership of the American Legion.

Fang began his acceptance speech by saying "America is known as the land of the free, a land of opportunities. I dreamt about it when I was a little boy in Hong Kong. I learned about it when I was a youngster going through the schools in New York City. I defended it when I was a young man marching off to serve my country. And today I firmly believe it as I accept the opportunity to serve the 2.4 million members of The American Legion and the 24 million veterans of this great nation. I am humbled and honored." He also said, "As your commander, my biggest task is to represent and advocate on your behalf, all the policies and programs adopted by this convention and the NECs. I promise you that I will, to the best of my ability, support and promote your wishes." And Fang concluded "I am excited at the opportunity to share our views on many issues. I cannot promise you that I have answers for everything. I know I don't. But if we work together, I am sure we will find the right answers." We, the members of the Lt. B. R. Kimlau Post are proud and we know we have the right man to lead the American Legion. We also want to extend our congratulations to Sergeant-at-Arms David Louie; he is now the National Sergeant-at-Arms.

We are happy for Fang and at same time, we can not overlook the overwhelming response and generous support to the campaign effort for Fang´s quest to become the National Commander in 2011-2012. We are very pleased with the donations and sincerely thank you for the support. Special recognition must go out to Harvard Tang, the Chairman of the "Committee to Elect Fang A. Wong for National Commander" and Chairman of the Board Peter Woo for organizing the successful fundraising efforts in the Chinatown Community.

The 93rd National Convention was attended by the largest contingent of Post, Auxiliary, SAL and family members of the Kimlau Post. Also in attendance to witness history were seven members from the San Francisco Cathay Post and four members of the Boston Chinatown Post. President Barack Obama addressed the delegates during the convention. He proclaimed that he signed the largest VA budget in recent years. He also said he will push Congress to do more for veteran¡¦s benefits when the elected officials come back from summer break. He has instituted tax credits to companies for hiring veterans and has provided training for 100,000 veterans to help them ease back to civilian life through 2013. He also said he has programs in place to modernize the VA claim process to eradicate backlogs and end the problem of homeless veterans. Secretary of the State Hilary Clinton sent a video message. Other government officials who addressed the convention were House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi, House Representative Michele Bachman, Jeff Miller, Tim Waltz and Secretary of Veterans Affairs Eric K. Shinseki. Secretary Shinseki echoed President Obama¡¦s policy and stressed the VA"s core value ICARE to veterans - Integrity, Commitment, Advocacy, Respect and Excellent.

The Post leaders also attended the 93rd Department Convention in July in Binghamton, New York. W. Michael Bowen of the Warner – Van Riper Post 435, Waterloo County 7th District was elected Department Commander of the Legion for 2011-2012. Also congratulations to some of our own: Frank F. Gee, elected Department Vice Commander; Gabe B. Mui, appointed Department Commander’s Aide and John Chang, elected SAL Detachment Vice Commander.