BANGOR – Gov. John Baldacci signed on Monday an $83 million bond package as he and other supporters stood on the lawn of a University of Maine research site that is part of the legislation’s grand plan to make biomedical research a cornerstone of the Maine economy.

The bill, enacted by lawmakers July 29 and slated for a statewide referendum vote on Nov. 8, will ensure Maine’s place in the global market as a center for research and development while spurring employment at home, Baldacci said.

“We’ve got to invest in ourselves in order to grow ourselves,” the governor said during a gathering at the University College of Bangor, noting that the bill is expected to generate more than $200 million in federal and private funds.

The bond’s construction and transportation spending alone will create 2,300 jobs within the first two years, Baldacci said.

The compromise bond proposal includes more than $33 million for transportation projects, $20 million for economic development, $9 million for education, $12 million for land conservation and a working waterfront initiative, and nearly $9 million for clean water, environment and health projects.

Failing to make the final cut was a proposal to remove lead paint from low-income households and a bid to upgrade several of the state’s water pollution control facilities.

Baldacci signed the legislation just yards from the steps of the Bangor campus’s Camden Hall, which is slated to receive $1 million of the bond money for renovations to create a graduate school for biomedical research. With classes expected to begin by fall 2006, the program would be affiliated with The Jackson Laboratory in Bar Harbor and the MDI Biological Laboratory on Mount Desert Island, enabling students to work on research at the facilities.

The graduate program will be a vital part of a biotechnology network that will stimulate economic development in Maine, Baldacci said. The plan includes a new research lab in Brewer, which would be operated as the Maine Institute for Human Genetics and Health, a nonprofit subsidiary of Eastern Maine Healthcare Systems. The attraction of more researchers, the results of their work, and improved local access to new technology eventually will lead to better health care for Mainers, he said.

As traditional industries in the state decline, biomedical research is emerging as an economic engine in Maine, John Forrest of the MDI Biological Lab said Tuesday on behalf of the Maine Biomedical Research Coalition, which represents five research institutions including Jackson Lab and Scarborough’s Foundation for Blood Research.

“Maine must act now and in the future if the state is to emerge as a leader in this area,” Forrest said, noting that the coalition has created 500 jobs in the last four years with an average annual salary of $62,500.

Also represented Tuesday were legislators and officials from the city and the University of Maine.

“This bond is an investment, the most important investment Maine can make in its future,” University of Maine System Chancellor Joseph Westphal said Monday.

Other bond money will make its way to the Orono campus’s Witter Farm for safety and health improvements and to the University of Southern Maine for a career center at the Lewiston-Auburn campus, he said.

Missing from Monday’s crowd were opponents of the bond package, including some of the Republican lawmakers who voted against the proposal last month arguing the amount was too high. Other lawmakers, however, had hoped for more bond money to conserve more land and to stimulate more job growth.

The proposal is less than half the $197 million bond package first offered by the governor. Recent developments in the state’s economy – including possible military installation closures and a downgrade in the state’s bond rating – prompted Democrats and Republicans to lower their expectations for the size of the bond package to keep state spending under control.

“We have to change the way we’re doing things, and the way to change the way we’re doing things is to invest in research and development,” Baldacci said.

The graduate program will be part of a biotechnology network that will stimulate economic development

2-4 lines quote