More Bad News for Maine: BRAC List Targets Three Maine Facilities

The economy of Maine has taken a beating in recent years with the closing of many manufacturing enterprises-shoe factories, textile mills, paper mills. The list seems to go on and on. People once earning a living wage with health insurance coverage are now forced to either relocate or accept a lower paying (likely near-minimum wage) job in the retail or service industries. The standard of living in all of Maine has been drastically affected by these changes

But in the recent round of base closure and realignment, Maine has been even more severely affected. Brunswick Naval Air Base is slated for realignment, which in plain language means it is being reduced to a skeleton crew. Portsmouth Naval Shipyard in Kittery, on the other hand, is to be closed completely.

Though these changes are serious and will have a negative impact on the economy of southern Maine, no change is more significant than the scheduled closing of the Defense Finance and Accounting Service in Limestone. Aroostook County was hit hard when Loring Air Force Base was closed in the early 1990's. The DFAS, located on the grounds of the former air base, was to be one way this poor, rural region was supposed to recover from the economic impact of Loring's closure. Now the same area has once again been targeted. How are the families of Aroostook County to recover? The sad fact is, there are few job opportunities in this economically disadvantaged area. Many families have multiple members employed by this facility-husband and wife both will be unemployed. There will be no more health insurance for their families.

One can only wonder why Maine has been targeted so severely by BRAC. Is it because we are a poor, low population state? We don't have the political clout of some of the larger, more populous states.

Statements have been issued that suggest that it is not in our country's best interest to continue to squander its military resources in this manner-that is not necessary to have active duty bases in Maine. But how can this be true, when at least one of the September 11th terrorists traveled through Maine to Boston and the first attack on our country that day happened in the Northeast-New York.

Moving a squandron of fighter planes from the northeast (Brunswick, Maine) to Florida does not make sense. Unfortunately, very few of our government's actions are sensible.