UM’s Forsee’s statement on Nixon’s freeze of university projects
Not surprisingly, the folks at the University of Missouri are none too pleased by Gov. Jay Nixon’s budget announcement this morning. Nixon is vetoing some state funding, and has frozen other funds slated for a variety of projects, including the university’s long-sought Benton-Stadler science complex at UMSL and the Ellis Fischel Cancer Center in Columbia. (For more background, check out my previous blog post.)
Here is the full statement from Gary Forsee, the UM president, on the matter:
“The University of Missouri System is disappointed that the governor has chosen to withhold funding for Ellis Fischel Cancer Center in Columbia and Benton/Stadler Halls at the University of Missouri-St. Louis, as well as eliminate funding for the agricultural experiment station projects across the state. As a practical consequence, all planning for these projects must come to a halt as the university re-evaluates its options.
“These construction and renovation projects enjoy wide public support and address long-standing problems with aging facilities that no longer serve the purposes for which they are intended. We fully understand the state is facing challenging financial times, but eliminating or delaying funding for shovel-ready projects represents a missed opportunity to stimulate the economy by providing jobs and better education and health care services for Missourians.”
The Grade is the St. Louis region’s premier blog on education and child welfare. To read other recent posts, go to www.stltoday.com/thegrade.
Kavita Kumar covers higher education for the Post-Dispatch. 
Several of the Mizzou projects are worthy of attention and funding, notably Ellis Fischel, which the state dumped on the university in the early ’90s and should continue to support. But the ag experiment station projects are largely pork (pardon the pun). They want to have nice facilities like the politically powerful Bootheel Mafia do down in Portageville, thanks to Kit Bond and some ill-directed HUD dollars. The Delta Center has a “machine shed” that seems to exist for the primary purpose of holding a big Republican lovefest breakfast every year during their field day.