Military Saves Campaign Promotes Culture of Saving
Story and photo by MC2(SW/AW) John Smolinski, CFAY Public Affairs Fleet and Family Support Center


Tricia Marino, FFSC Yokosuka personal financial manager, explains to children the inportance of saving during a presentation at School Age Care Feb. 24. The events for the day also included games that promoted the theme of saving money.

(FFSC) Yokosuka hosts support events including financial management classes, financial briefs for service members and their families including single Sailors, teens and youth for Military Saves campaign week Feb. 19-26.

FFSC Yokosuka coordinated with Morale, Welfare and Recreation, Community Bank, Navy Federal Credit Union, Navy Marine Corps Relief Society and the Commissary to provide events for the Military Saves Week campaign. Military Saves is co-sponsored by Consumer Federation of America and Department of Defense (DoD) as an integral part of the DoD’s financial readiness campaign.

“This was our opportunity for the military community to come together with other resources to focus on financial readiness of military members and their families,” said Tricia Marino, FFSC Yokosuka personal financial manager. “This was a great way to motivate, educate and encourage our military families to save every month.”

Military Saves’ goal includes increasing services members and their families household short and long term savings while decreasing consumer debt.

In the past five years, more than 100,000 military members and their families have taken the saver pledge to save money, reduce debt and build wealth over time.

“The savers pledge is about making a commitment to yourself to save for your future,” said Marino. “You are stating you are ready to start saving and taking control of your money and not your money taking control of you. The key is to start saving now no matter how small. In the long run the results will be big. This year’s slogan is ‘Start Small Think Big.’”

Once someone takes the pledge they will receive monthly email newsletter with great information and tips they may not have known about otherwise. The most recent newsletter included tax information and a special code to get your FICO score for free. Anyone interested can still go to www.militarysaves.org and read the newsletters and get their code for a free credit score. This code is good until the end of March.

Military Saves seeks to develop a military command climate and overall culture that supports prudent financial behavior by focusing on education and counseling.

Support from the local banking community includes incentives for savings products, especially regular, automatic deposits, systematic increase in amount of deposits and advance planning for purchasing and investing.

“I would like to thank the many organizations on base that helped with this year’s Military Saves Week campaign,” said Marino. “Navy Marine Corps Relief Society, Community Bank, Navy Federal, Commissary, MWR Liberty Center, MWR Teen Center, MWR SAC, MWR Library, all have done a great job helping to promote a culture of savings.”

Service members and their families are encouraged to take financial action to improve their financial well-being.

“Through out the year our focus is to empower members to become financially stable through saving, debt reduction and wealth-building over time. It is never too late to get started.”