In reading the April 7 Times Record I had to look twice at the article about the cost of building the Zumwalt-Class Destroyer ships. The first of these destroyers is presently being built at BIW. The staggering cost listed was $12.74 billion for three ships.

It caused me to wonder about priorities in our country. It made me consider what other services could be provided to our citizens if only two of these ships were built. The approximate savings of $4.25 billion by building one less ship could send every one of the approximately 14,000 graduating high school students in Maine each year to four full years of college at $50,000.00 a year with $1.45 billion left over.

It could buy health care coverage at $10,000.00 a person for 425,000 citizens.

While local towns scour their budgets for savings for schools and road maintenance and new vehicles for fire and police departments the article notes a $450 million increase in the cost of these three ships for this year’s fiscal budget over the previous year.

Looking to the future will we be a more secure country with one more super, high tech ship or with a healthier and better educated public? There needs to be an ongoing discussion between the public and our elected officials to help shape reasonable priorities and a reasonable use of our tax dollars to meet the needs of our citizens.

Allen Northup,
Brunswick