Monday, Feb. 20, 2012
Editorial: Raising the ante on NBAF
By The Capital-Journal Editorial Board cjonline.com Copyright 2012 CJ Online. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
FILE PHOTOGRAPH/THE CAPITAL-JOURNAL
Cattle graze in what will one day be the site of NBAF. In the distance is the LHC Bill Snyder Family Stadium.
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Latest by doyourhomework 17 hours 39 min ago
The abundance of fiscally conservative Republicans working under our Capitol dome could lead some to believe that volunteering to pick up an even larger portion of the tab for a federal facility wouldn’t be high on their list of things to do.
Fortunately, that is not the case.
Legislative leaders say they might be willing to increase the state’s participation in the venture — a National Bio- and Agro-Defense Facility in Manhattan — to keep it on track and ensure it comes our way.
State officials apparently don’t have clue yet how much the price tag on that would be. We don’t either, but we think they are right to explore the possibilities and do whatever they can, within reason, to move the NBAF project along. Kansans already have invested in the project and putting some more dollars into it might be the sensible thing to do. But we don’t want to own the facility.
Progress, or the lack thereof, on NBAF became an issue recently when President Barack Obama declined to include in his 2013 budget proposal any money for the facility’s construction. Rather, his budget recommendation was for the Department of Homeland Security to reassess the project, its scope and alternatives.
The last time we read DHS, NBAF and reassess in the same paragraph there was a move afoot by other states to hijack the facility from Kansas.
Gov. Sam Brownback says he has been reassured that reassessment in this case means looking at the money.
Kansas already has given DHS land for the facility and authorized $105 million in bonds to construct a utility plant for it. The price tag on the facility itself still is being reported as $650 million, but there has been talk that the final cost could exceed that figure substantially.
Senate President Steve Morris, R-Hugoton, has said he doesn’t have a problem with a modest increase in the state debt level if that’s what it takes to get the problem rolling. Morris said he had discussed the issue with Brownback but declined to provide any details of their talk.
House Speaker Mike O’Neal, R-Hutchinson, however, said he was of the same mind as the governor on the issue and that if the financing scheme has to change to get NBAF built that’s what should be done.
Bonding, O’Neal said, could be part of the solution.
Those conversations indicate nothing is set in stone, but clearly O’Neal; Morris, one of NBAF’s biggest supporters in the Legislature; and Brownback are willing to consider raising the state’s ante if that becomes necessary.
NBAF alone will bring a lot of well-paid scientists and researchers to the state. Kansas also is counting on the facility to be an anchor for an animal health corridor stretching from Columbia, Mo., to Manhattan, that would involve hundreds of animal health companies involved in research and development.
To say NBAF would be a huge player in the state’s economic future would be putting it mildly.
Given the stakes, some additional investment by the state may well be warranted.
