Kilmer praises SAFE Boats, talks border security
BREMERTON — U.S. Rep. Derek Kilmer stopped by one of the peninsula's biggest employers Thursday, talking with workers on SAFE Boats' campus and giving his autograph to a class of patrol vessel whose production line he helped ensure would keep going.
"Go SAFE Boats," penned Kilmer, a Gig Harbor Democrat, on an inside panel of a 41-foot Coastal Interceptor Vessel bound for the U.S. Customs and Border Protection agency.
The program to produce 52 of the aluminum-made vessels had been on the chopping block for the Trump Administration last year. Kilmer and others helped to get $14.5 million to maintain the production at the Bremerton company, which currently sits at 270 employees and growing.
'You make products that keep us safer'
"His focus is aligned with the things we care about," company CEO Richard Schwarz told employees gathering within a key production warehouse.
"You make products that keep us safer," added Kilmer, who serves on both the House appropriations committee as well as the House defense appropriations subcommittee.
The congressman took questions and criticized the body he called as popular as "head lice and colonoscopies." Kilmer is currently leading a select committee to modernize Congress, one he hopes can make it more bipartisan and effective. He got applause from those gathered when he mentioned he pushed legislation that would cease pay for Congress if the government ever shut down.
He worried gains in the stock market weren't being "felt by everybody in every place." And, fielding several questions about immigration, he said he hoped for a comprehensive solution that analyzed the need for a border wall, added boosts to technology to help with border security and provided a path to residency for dreamers, those brought by their parents to the United States illegally.
'I'm concerned about seeing funding taken away'
After the meeting, Kilmer said he was also concerned about money the Department of Defense is considering diverting from projects — including to extend a pier at Naval Base Kitsap-Bangor — to help fund a wall on the country's southern border. Currently, the pier extension, which would provide a place for the Navy's three Seawolf-class submarines at Bangor, is funded at $89 million, though a bid for contracts suggests overall bids between $100 million to $250 million.
"I'm concerned about seeing funding taken away from any investments in our national security for a border wall," Kilmer said.
Kilmer also talked up ways to improve "career-connected" courses for students at the event. He advocated for trades that will help students make the transition from high school straight into jobs. "Not everyone goes to college, and that's OK," he said.
He also mentioned that the nearby Puget Sound Naval Shipyard was in dire need of — and in line for — modernization. Navy plans have identified the need for about $20 billion for the nation's four Navy shipyards, or about $5 billion per yard. Along with improvements there, he told the crowd that work needed to be done on the road network to get workers to their jobs, namely through Gorst.
"I hope you just count me on the home team," he said.
By: Josh Farley
Source: Kitsap Sun