Backers Cry Foul on Science Legislation (Boston Globe)

Say measure weaker, laden with earmarks
By Matt Viser and Peter Schworm, Globe Staff  |  May 20, 2008

As the Legislature finally prepares to produce a $1 billion life sciences bill more than a year after it was conceived, some of the industry's most ardent advocates are losing enthusiasm, saying the legislation has been watered down and larded with earmarks.

The result, those industry executives said, is likely to be a law stripped of much of Governor Deval Patrick's original intent, one that could fall short of its promise to lure thousands of well-paying jobs to the state and to cure diseases around the world.

"We've missed an opportunity," said Christopher R. Anderson, president of the Massachusetts High Technology Council, a business advocacy group. "We've really undermined the effectiveness on what is otherwise a terrific concept for a long-term economic growth initiative."

The governor's initial proposal sought to empower a panel of industry specialists and academic leaders to decide how to spend $1 billion over 10 years in several targeted areas, much like a similar program in California. But lawmakers in the Senate and House decided how and where to dole out large portions of the $1 billion that would be spent in the bill, which could emerge from a conference committee as early as this week, earmarking hundreds of millions of dollars in funding for specific projects, even giving names to individual buildings and grants.

House lawmakers earmarked $49.5 million to build a science center at the Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts in North Adams, though the school currently has no science graduate programs. The college is, however, the alma mater of Representative Daniel E. Bosley, a North Adams Democrat who wrote the House legislation and has frequently joked at press conferences and legislative hearings that "spending $1 billion doesn't go quite as far as it used to."

In addition, legislators have designated $12.6 million for a highway interchange near Andover, and $12.9 million for a sewage treatment plant in Framingham, money designed, they said, to spur local development for life sciences companies. The University of Massachusetts system also gets a windfall for new buildings, with $95 million going to the Amherst campus, $90 million to Worcester, and $10 million to Lowell.

In a pointed letter to top legislative leaders last month, three university presidents - Drew Faust of Harvard, Susan Hockfield of MIT, and Jack Wilson of UMass - criticized the bill's emphasis on individual earmarks and called on lawmakers to give industry and academic specialists on the governor's proposed panel greater voice in how the state's money is invested.

"A peer-reviewed, strategic approach to these challenges is critical to the success of these programs and affords consistency and accountability," the university presidents said in their letter, which was also signed by Henri Termeer, chief executive of Genzyme Corp.

Lawmakers defend the earmarks, saying it is their job to protect taxpayer money.

"We are responsible for the public dollars," said Representative Michael J. Rodrigues, a Democrat from Westport and cochairman of the Massachusetts Biotechnology Caucus. "Our job is to spend money where we as legislators feel [it] is necessary."

Because the House and Senate passed different versions of the bill, a group of legislators is hammering out a compromise bill in a conference committee. If the Legislature approves the bill, the governor could also return the bill if he disagrees with the changes.