Secretary of the Navy Carlos Del Toro, left, visits the Coast Guard Academy on Oct. 13, 2023. (Petty Officer 2nd Class Taylor Bacon/U.S. Coast Guard)
Defense News reports the Secretary of the Navy has initiated an attempt to improve commercial shipbuilding in the US by coordinating the efforts of all the federal agencies that fund ship construction including the Navy, Army and Department of Defense, the Coast Guard, the Maritime Administration, and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
“He said the council will meet quarterly but that staff-level meetings will take place more regularly. The group will first establish metrics to measure their success and write and sign a charter to explain their mission.”
There are potentially many topics of interest, hopefully shipbuilders will be asked for their input as well. “How can we streamline the process?” Survivability requirements that drive up size and cost should be looked at for at least some classes.
I would propose a pilot project, development of a true small surface combatant, optimized as an ASW escort to protect sea lines of communication, that could be built in second line shipyards, in large numbers if required for mobilization and that could be a dual service ship, used by both the Navy and Coast Guard in peacetime with perhaps different weapons outfits. It might also serve as a design for foreign military sales.
Such a ship should be capable towing a towed array ASW sensor and operating an ASW helicopter like the MH-60R and a VTOL UAS capable of complimenting ASW search functions of both the ship and helicopter.
It should be possible to keep the size of such a ship under 4,000 tons. The Gibbs and Cox proposal for a light frigate for Australia might be a good starting point.
The Australian Light Frigate (foreground) and Constellation class (background) on the Gibbs and Cox stand during Indo Pacific 2023.
Chuck Hill's CG Blog 
I wish they’d said more about the propulsion on their model. I suspect its going to use heavily from Constellation. 12V gensets instead of 20V. LM2500+ instead of L2500+G4 and maybe half the electric motor.
It’s a great idea Chuck. It will only happen though with a very strong push from above.
Getting both services to align requirements and programs is a tough thing to do.
Perhaps the timing is right now. It would certainly be good for industry and the building of a true national fleet.
I imagine NOAA and the Navy could design and contract out a single hull and engineering design which could cover multiple ships of similar requirements, such as a medium-small ship optimized for undersea work replacing: SURTASS Ocean Surveillance Ships, Salvage Ships, NOAA Survey / Research ships. All of these have similar towing or over-the-side / undersea requirements. The vast majority of vessels doing all of these jobs are similarly-sized at 250-ish feet long.
Another cross-over area would be a need for new classes of large auxiliaries, such as Hospital Ships, Tenders, and Command Ships. These all seem to be in the range of 600’.