Local lawmakers reach out to Obama on aircaft carriers...

It's always nice to start a note off with a complimentary tone - and local lawmakers from both sides of the aisle kicked their Tuesday plea off on the right foot.

"Dear President-Elect Obama: Congratulations on your hard-fought and historic election."

Now down to business.   

Five local lawmakers have inked a letter to President-elect Barack Obama asking him to take a second look at the plan to move an aircraft carrier to Mayport, Florida. The lawmakers say that the $500 million needed to upgrade the port facility in Florida is a waste and simply a duplicate effort.

This is probably one of the few times you're going to see a joint note from U.S. Rep. Thelma Drake and U.S. Rep-elect Glenn Nye. In addition to those signatures the letter also bears the names of U.S. Reps. Randy Forbes, Robert C. "Bobby" Scott, and Rob Wittman. 

 Here's the meat of the letter:

For this reason, we wanted to offer a bipartisan suggestion as to how you can save half a billion dollars that could be directed towards more critical defense priorities as you prepare your Fiscal Year 2010 budget.  Today, the Navy announced its preference to expand its footprint by investing $500 million to upgrade the Navy’s port at Mayport, Florida to accommodate a nuclear aircraft carrier in addition to the existing East Coast port in Norfolk, Virginia. This cost does not include the additional annual expense of dredging in the harbor in Mayport or the personnel and operational impacts of starting up and shutting down the nuclear component of the port each time a carrier docks in Mayport.

 Most importantly, this decision ignores the fact that there is no national security or strategic rationale requiring this buildup, unlike the decision in recent years to increase the proportion of the Navy’s fleet in the Pacific from 50% to 60% to balance an expanding Chinese Navy.  Some have suggested that our East Coast aircraft carriers must be strategically disbursed to avoid a Pearl Harbor-like attack.  As any sailor can tell you, these carriers are dispersed around the world on a routine basis in times of peace, and in times of war.  In fact, the last time all the carriers were in port at Norfolk for a matter of days, many pictures were taken because it was such a unique event.

Our concern remains that this would be an unwise use of taxpayer dollars in the face of a serious budget deficit.  We are in agreement that we should focus on completing the ongoing consolidation of military facilities as prescribed in the 2005 BRAC law, not spending money to expand a footprint the Department of Defense asked Congress to reduce just three years ago.  As Admiral Mike Mullen has stated, extensive analysis has demonstrated that we need a minimum of 313-ships in our Navy.  We do not see how we can get there if we do not make the tough budget choices and the easy ones.  We humbly suggest to you that choosing not to expand the number of nuclear ports on the East Coast is one of the easy choices.

Comments

[Bitter Typical White Person]

This is laughable....This Commonwealth (and most southern states) are wedded to the teat of Washington DC through defense spending. DC sends back a buck and more for every dollar sent.

A stinking 10,000 job loss to this area is chump change to the millions lost in the Midwest due to crap trade agreements sending good middle class jobs to slave labor in china and elsewhere.

Michigan and Ohio would kill for a loss of only 10,000 jobs! Suck is up.