The University of Texas at Austin Athletics
Texas Lottery Veteran Recognition: Gabriel R. Salazar
09.01.2023 | Football, Longhorn Sports Properties / Learfield
The retired Navy captain will be honored when Texas Football hosts Rice on Saturday, Sept. 2.
A passion for service, resourceful financial allocation and leadership development has guided Gabriel Salazar during a United States Navy and government career that spans four decades. Salazar began as a Naval Aviator in 1980, participated in two Persian Gulf deployments and later translated his command experience into budget formulation expertise at the Pentagon.
Salazar graduated from The University of Texas at Austin in 1979 with a degree in finance and management and was commissioned through the Naval ROTC. Following flight training, Salazar progressed into a diverse aviation career, accumulating more than 4,000 flight hours in multiple naval aircraft, while also commanding a patrol squadron and air wing. Salazar had responsibility for Patrol Squadron Nine, and during deployment, in support of the Fifth Fleet operations, his pilots flew intelligence and reconnaissance missions in areas around the Indian Ocean. Additionally, Salazar commanded Training Air Wing Four in Corpus Christi, Texas, where he was responsible for developing and designating aviators for the Navy, Marine Corps, Air Force and Coast Guard in multi-engine aircraft. During Salazar's tenure, the air wing flew more than 230,000 training hours without accident.
"We emphasized flying, safety and mission accomplishment," Salazar said. "That wing flew more hours of any wing in the U.S. Navy, and it was a team effort to show that you can accomplish the mission in a safe manner."
Navy operational officers are encouraged to develop a sub-specialty, a process which allowed Salazar to grow and apply his undergraduate interests. Salazar said he always had a strong desire to attend Navy Post Graduate School in Monterey, California, and after earning a master's degree in financial management, Salazar transitioned to shore duty assignments in the Navy's budget formulation process.
"Warfighters – those who have operationally deployed – understand needs differently, because they have been in command and have experienced real-world operations, and in many cases in high threat environments," Salazar said. "They bring an operational relevance to the financial aspect of defense."
Salazar served as Director of Financial Programming and Budget Development for the Assistant Chief of Naval Operations for Naval Warfare and for the Assistant Chief of Naval Operations for Manpower and Personnel at the Pentagon in Washington, D.C. In those roles, Salazar guided resource allocation, budget formulation and financial programming for a Naval defense budget that exceeded $170 billion. Maintaining mission readiness requires training and manpower, and Salazar said there are always more requirements than dollars, so the question becomes how to best fund those warfighting requirements.
"It's a process to determine where to spend and advise senior staff on how to allocate resources," Salazar said. "What do you actually fund? Ships or airplanes or people?" It comes down to how to mitigate risk in all three."
Following retirement from active duty, Salazar still serves as an executive consultant and sought-after expert who is often called upon by Navy leadership to advise on emergent financial issues. Salazar remains passionately connected to the work and focuses often on personnel matters, compensation questions, and how to make service attractive to younger populations. In his last tour of active duty, Salazar commanded the Naval ROTC unit at UT Austin, the first University of Texas alumnus to do so, and taught as a professor of Naval Science, providing a leadership class to midshipmen who were about to be commissioned as officers.
Salazar also serves as chairman of the Midshipmans Foundation, a nonprofit UT Naval ROTC alumni organization, which established an endowment and last year provided more than $130,000 in scholarships and support to the ROTC unit.
In his work as an executive consultant and coach, Salazar says he helps others find a personal connection and passion for their work, a principle that Salazar embodies.
"It was not part of my grand plan necessarily to retire from the Navy and start a consulting business," Salazar said. "But the friendships and personal bonds kept me connected to those issues."
Salazar and his wife, Kathleen, who also graduated from UT Austin, reside in Austin.
Thanks to the Texas Lottery, great things are happening all across Texas. The Texas Lottery now consistently contributes more than $1.6 billion of lottery revenue each year to good causes like public education and veterans' assistance programs. Beginning with the first veterans' dedicated scratch ticket game in 2009, the Texas Lottery has now contributed over $219 million to the Fund for Veterans' Assistance.
Since 1992, the Texas Lottery has generated more than $37.5 billion in revenue for the state of Texas. Through strict adherence to their vision, mission and core values, the Texas Lottery is dedicated to ensuring that this support continues.
