Senate OKs bonding bill

03/24/2006

But spending plan’s $1 billion price tag is higher than Pawlenty’s request

BY BILL SALISBURY
Pioneer Press

The Minnesota Senate on Thursday voted to launch a $1 billion state construction program this spring.

That money would pay for the first of five medical biosciences buildings the University of Minnesota wants to construct over the next 10 years, and it would add scores of new classrooms, laboratories and libraries at public colleges across the state.

The bonding bill also would fund dozens of park and trail improvements, forest and wildlife area enhancements and flood-control projects. It would expand some prisons and a state hospital lockup for sexual predators.

It gives a green light to the Northstar commuter rail line from Minneapolis to Big Lake and to continued planning for a light-rail line in the Central Corridor between downtown St. Paul and downtown Minneapolis.

But some of those projects may be trimmed back in the next few weeks. The Senate bill, which seeks to borrow $990 million to finance capital improvements, is $145 million richer than Gov. Tim Pawlenty’s request for building projects, and the Republican-controlled House is almost certain to demand a lower price tag.

House Capital Investment Committee Chairman Dan Dorman, R-Albert Lea, predicted the final bonding bill would be “somewhere in the $925 million of $950 million range.” He said the House would pass its version before Easter.

The bonding bill is considered the most important bill of the legislative session in an even-numbered year, when lawmakers don’t have to fund the state’s operating budget. When they pass it, the Legislature could adjourn and go home.

The Senate passed its version on a bipartisan, 56-9 vote.

“A bonding bill is more than mortar, bricks and cement. It’s about jobs, but it’s also about a state’s vision,” Senate Majority Leader Dean Johnson, DFL-Willmar, said before the vote. This bill, he said, shows the state’s priorities are higher education, the environment and transportation.

State colleges and universities would be the big winners under the Senate plan. They would get $321 million or about one-third of the money provided in the bill.

That’s as it should be, said Sen. Keith Langseth, DFL-Glyndon, chairman of the Capital Investment Committee and the bonding bill sponsor. “Public higher education is the No. 1 responsibility of the state of Minnesota.”

The Senate would spend $92 million more than Pawlenty on state colleges.

The Senate version also differs from the governor’s on the need to fund the University of Minnesota’s medical biosciences building. The Senate approved $40 million. Pawlenty had recommended just $4.3 million for planning that project, but his spokesman, Brian McClung, said the governor is willing to negotiate with legislators on the building — as long as the overall price tag on the bonding bill comes down.

To pay for the biosciences building, Langseth cut in half — from $26.6 million to $13.3 million — the allocation for expanding the U’s Carlson School of Management. Langseth said he hopes to restore full funding later in negotiations.

The Senate rejected Pawlenty’s request for $28 million to expand the Faribault state prison. Langseth said that expansion will be needed in the future, but it can wait for a year or two because the Corrections Department has not spent the $85 million it received for that prison last year.

Stillwater state prison would get $19.6 million for a 150-bed segregation unit under the Senate bill, and the Shakopee women’s prison would get $5.4 million for a 92-bed expansion but not the $5 million it requested to erect a fence around the facility.

The Minnesota Zoo would get $8 million for repairs and renovations under the Senate bill, but not the $13 million Pawlenty requested to build new exhibits and facilities. By contrast, the Senate would give Como Zoo $9 million for upgrades that Pawlenty didn’t recommend.

One big loser in the bill was the Duluth Entertainment and Convention Center, which had requested, with Pawlenty’s support, $33.7 million for a new arena. The Senate gave it zero.

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Here are several projects in the east metro that are funded in the Senate bonding bill:

Century College science and library building: $19.9 million

Ordway Center for the Performing Arts renovation: $10 million

Como Zoo improvements: $9 million

Minnesota Zoo repairs and improvements: $8 million

St. Paul Union Depot renovation for transit center: $6.3 million

Cedar Avenue bus rapid-transit way: $5 million

St. Paul College transportation and applied technology labs and shops: $3 million

Port Crosby park development in South St. Paul: $2 million

Robert Street Corridor transitway preliminary design: $1 million