University at Buffalo - The State University of New York

Published: July 15, 2004

By SUE WUETCHER
Reporter Editor

The leaders of the New York State Legislature each came to Buffalo during the past week and committed a total of $20 million to the Buffalo Life Sciences Complex.

Senate Majority Leader Joseph L. Bruno and Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver each pledged $10 million for recruiting scientists and making renovations, with the money expected to come from an unspecified pool of capital funds that would be established as part of the state budget.

Bruno, speaking on Friday at a press conference held across the street from the life sciences complex under construction on the Buffalo Niagara Medical Campus in downtown Buffalo, expressed hope that $10 million each also would come from Gov. George Pataki and the institutions that make up the medical campus.

"You need $40 million to make what's here operational," he said.

Under the Senate proposal, $20 million in capital funds would be committed to the Buffalo-Niagara Pioneers of Science Development fund for equipment and related laboratory renovations to recruit scientists. An additional $20 million in capital funds would be provided for the Buffalo Niagara Medical Campus Infrastructure Fund to create state-of-the-art space for start-up companies that develop through the transfer and application of biomedical research to new businesses and jobs.

"The Senate has made economic growth, especially in biotechnology, a major priority and today's announcement builds on our efforts to strengthen and expand the biotechnology industry in Western New York," Bruno said.

Appearing Monday at a news conference at Buffalo General Hospital, Silver and his legislative colleagues presented a mock check for $10 million to Bruce Holm, UB senior vice provost and executive director of the New York State Center of Excellence in Bioinformatics and Life Sciences.

"The elite bio-research institutions that comprise the Buffalo Niagara Medical Campus give us the brain power for a burgeoning life-sciences economy," Silver said. "What is necessary now is the investment to address capital construction needs and to attract top-notch people to this high-tech corridor."

The funding signifies "the next phase in the government-academia partnership to utilize university research and development as an economic engine in Upstate New York," noted Holm, who was joined at both press conferences by President John B. Simpson, David Hohn, president and chief executive office of Roswell Park Cancer Institute, and George DeTitta, executive director of Hauptman-Woodward Medical Research Institute and UB professor of structural biology.

The Buffalo Life Sciences Complex, at Virginia and Ellicott streets, will house Roswell Park Cancer Institute's Center for Genetics and Pharmacology, the New York State Center of Excellence in Bioinformatics and Life Sciences, and a new building for the Hauptman-Woodward Medical Research Institute and its Structural Biology Research Center.