The July 5 article about the new hybrid ferries was a real eye-opener.
The cost to the Washington state taxpayers of these three ferries is more than $360 million each.
A quick search of shipbuilding costs reveals that a 10,000-plus-ton luxury cruise ship — more than twice the size of these ferries, ice-strengthened for sailing to Antarctica — was recently built in Finland for about $115 million.
To add insult to injury, the $715 million that the hulls cost isn’t even spent in Washington.
This order could have provided 1,300 jobs, but, according to the CEO of the losing Washington state shipbuilder, “the state’s union-level wage and apprentice utilization requirements, small business and veteran set-asides, strict environmental rules and a mandatory DEI officer added costs that could not be overcome.”
State-mandated DEI officers? You must be kidding.
No wonder that work like this, and the jobs that come with it, go to business-friendly Republican states like Florida.
We are paying a high price for living in what is effectively a one-party state, where those in power have few limits on making taxpayers pay for their ideological agendas.
When will voters wake up?
Kaj Ahlburg
Port Angeles