El Al Airlines of Israel will never make a profit, the reason is simple: fleet underutilization. The aircraft are grounded on Shabbat and the costs are passed on to the taxpayer.

Montezuma County Sheriff’s Department cars are used even less, as the deputies take them home and they are used just five shifts out of a possible 21 shifts per week.

Now I am sure the sheriff would say the cars have to go home just in case of an emergency. Let’s say all deputies are needed once a year, what is the cost of this? Well, the department’s new trucks will cost each and every warm human body in the county $31.33, ($796,961/population 25,431).

If the sheriff kept the vehicles at the station to be used all 21 shifts per week, he would need one-third fewer cars for a total cost of $265,654 – a difference of $531,307. So for the sheriff’s once-a-year “just in case” policy of sending vehicles home with the deputies, we taxpayers get to pay a half million more.

With the waste happening in government, we cannot afford this tax-and-spend sheriff, and furthermore, shame on the Journal for not asking the sheriff these questions on tax waste.

Nels Werner

Cortez