Robert O’Hara, 63, of Vero Beach, passed away on July 17, 2014, surrounded by his family, due to complications from a heart attack a week earlier.
Born in Bridgeport, Conn., O’Hara was raised in Fairfield, where he graduated from Andrew Warde High School in 1968. He attended St Michael’s College in Vermont for one year before entering the Coast Guard Academy. Commissioned as a proud member of the Class of 1973, he remained on active duty until his retirement in 1996.
During the first half of his career, O’Hara established his professional credentials as a seasoned sailor and expert ship-handler during assignments on the United States Coast Guard Cutters Planetree, Mallow (Honolulu, Hawaii), Red Cedar (Portsmouth, Va.), and Hornbeam (Cape May, N.J.). His final sea duty was command of the Firebush, home ported in Kodiak, Alaska.
All of the ships were buoy tenders, tasked with maintaining the aids to navigation that guide safe passage of boats and vessels transiting critical federal waterways. He was privileged to sail with outstanding crews, who, like him, were awed by the places they visited and underway experiences they shared.
During assignments ashore, O’Hara was deeply committed to training and educating the Coast Guard’s workforce. He earned his first advanced degree, a Masters of Arts in Liberal Studies from Wesleyan University, to prepare for duties as an Assistant Professor in the Physics Department at the Coast Guard Academy. There, he taught courses in mechanics, electromagnetic theory and modern physics to sophomores and basic math to freshmen.
He especially treasured teaching seamanship, sailing, and leadership to cadets during summer training cruises to the Caribbean, Europe and the north Atlantic on the Coast Guard’s 295-foot square rigged Barque Eagle.
While serving as the Assistant Training Officer at Training Center Cape May, he oversaw the indoctrination of more than 4500 recruits going through boot camp and the advanced studies of 1200 senior enlisted members enrolled in specialized courses.
In 1989, following command of the Firebush, O’Hara reported to Coast Guard Headquarters to help establish a Strategic Planning staff to advise the Commandant on trends and events likely to influence future operations as well as long-range implications of the Service’s policy, personnel and budget choices.
Commander O’Hara was a master at facilitating broad dialogue and healthy debate to enable well-informed decision-making at the most senior levels in the Service. His ground-breaking work positioned the Coast Guard as a government leader in strategic planning.
In his final military assignment, he served as a Special Assistant in the Office of the Secretary, Department of Transportation. There, Commander O’Hara guided the Department’s ten agency administrators in preparing written Performance Agreements with the Secretary, ensuring outcomes consistent with agency goals and aligned with overarching departmental mandates.
As testament to O’Hara’s intellect and influence, he represented the Department Of Transportation on the Vice President’s National Performance Review Task Force and constructed the Secretary’s 1996 Performance Agreement with the President of the United States.
Retirement did not last long. Through the Department of Defense Troops to Teachers Program, O’Hara obtained an Accelerated Certification in Teaching from the Notre Dame University of Maryland and then taught physics, general science, and math at the Cape May County Technical School. But his passion remained with the Coast Guard, so he returned to Headquarters as a consultant to the Waterways Management Program. He enjoyed this work immensely. Their analysis of waterways management as a growth area for the Department Of Transportation, the Maritime Administration, and the Coast Guard culminated in a Secretary of Transportation initiative to establish a public-private partnership to improve ports, waterways and intermodal transportation connections across the nation.
Following the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, O’Hara took a position as a program analyst in the Office of Training and Quality Performance in the newly established Transportation Security Administration. In that role, he was a key member of the go-team that established and scheduled initial training of more than 21,000 baggage screeners and co-developed the nationwide deployment of TSA’s baggage screening equipment. O’Hara’s contributions to the rapid start-up of this no-fail federal function were significant.
Always ready for a challenge, in 2003, he eagerly accepted yet another first-ever position as Director of the Project Support Staff, responsible to myriad multi-agency work groups and subject matter experts developing a National Strategy for Maritime Security. This comprehensive document, with eight implementation plans, synchronized maritime security policies, programs and agency initiatives into a cohesive whole-of-government effort to promote global economic stability and protect legitimate activities while preventing hostile or illegal acts in the maritime domain. The White House released the plan in 2005.
With that project accomplished and his wife Sally’s transfer in 2006 to the Fourteenth District in Honolulu, O’Hara decided it was time to retire and fully enjoy life in their official residence at Diamond Head Lighthouse. He was the ideal host to the many friends and family who visited them in paradise. There, O’Hara perfected his Mai Tai recipe, the ideal accompaniment to watching sunsets from the lanai.
He never tired of hiking to dramatic vistas, swimming in Hawaii’s gentle ocean waters, and living the spirit of Aloha. Always giving of his time, O’Hara joined the Coast Guard Auxiliary, the volunteers who support Coast Guard missions, to increase public awareness and understanding of the Service. He completed several courses at the University of Hawaii towards a master’s degree in Historic Preservation (he had enrolled in this degree program at Goucher College in 2004).
When the Coast Guard moved them back to Headquarters in 2008, O’Hara became a regular volunteer at the DC Central Kitchen while continuing his studies at Goucher. He thrived on the opportunities Sally’s positions, first as the Deputy Commandant for Operations and then as Vice Commandant, afforded him.
In the Fourteenth District, he had traveled with her on official visits to American Samoa, Guam, Japan, Thailand, and Singapore. From Washington, he accompanied her to the Dominican Republic, Mexico, and to numerous Coast Guard units across the United States.
As one of the few male spouses among her DOD peers and within the Coast Guard’s own flag officer/Senior Executive Service ranks, he delighted in reminding everyone that spouses are not just women, and whether male or female, are indispensable to their spouse and to the readiness of the Service.
O’Hara adored his family, his wife of 34-years, Sally, their sons Chip and Brice, and daughter-in-law Autumn. O’Hara and Sally met as junior officers stationed in Portsmouth, Va., in 1975. Vice Admiral Brice-O’Hara was the 27th Vice Commandant when she retired in 2012, after a 37-year Coast Guard career throughout which O’Hara was her staunchest advocate and supporter.
The couple relished the more leisurely pace of the past two years, whether at their homes in Annapolis or in Vero Beach. Long daily walks with their two West Highland Terriers as well as regular bike rides, kayaking, travel, and a long list of house projects filled their days. When in Florida, O’Hara was an active presence in the lives of his sisters.
His older son Chip is a District Manager with Le Pain Quotidien in New York City and lives in Brooklyn. Brice works for Salesforce.com and is an Intelligence Specialist Second Class in the Coast Guard Reserve. Brice’s wife Autumn is Executive Director of Ride-on Ranch, a non-profit dedicated to hippotherapy; they live in Purcellville, Va.
O’Hara is also survived by his mother-in-law, Anne Brice of Annapolis, and his four sisters and their spouses who live in Vero Beach: Jean and Mike Costello, Maureen and Jack Shupe, Dorothy Knapp, and Marjorie and Arthur Lewis. He believed in the power of family and friends and worked hard to maintain close ties with relatives, classmates, and Coast Guard shipmates.
The family asks that any remembrances go to the Coast Guard Foundation. For information, please see www.coastguardfoundation.org.
O’Hara’s daily habit whenever in Florida was a sunrise walk on the beach. His family honored that tradition with a private gathering at the ocean’s edge on July 18. There will be a memorial service in Annapolis at a future date.
