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Despite drama, FLC gets the green

$10M should get Berndt Hall rebuild underway in summer

DENVER – After years of trying, Fort Lewis College has finally secured funding from the state to rebuild its engineering building.

The state Senate gave final approval to a budget bill Monday that includes $10 million to begin construction on Berndt Hall this summer. An additional $13 million is expected to arrive in September.

The payment this fall will end a legislative saga that began when some of the college’s current engineering students were playing with blocks and wearing diapers.

“Obviously, we’re very excited and very happy,” said Steve Schwartz, who, as the college’s vice president of administration and finance, has been making a yearly pilgrimage to the Legislature to ask for funding.

It took a few weeks of political drama and intervention from the Senate’s top Republican to get money to the college this summer.

At one point this spring, the college had lost the money entirely, and as recently as last week, it was doubtful whether the payment would arrive in time to start work before the ground freezes next winter.

“Getting the funding in this manner allows us to start the construction this summer, which means we won’t miss a whole construction season,” Schwartz said.

The building’s projected opening date of fall 2016 remains on schedule, he said.

The project will give science students state-of-the-art laboratories, and it will expand space in the engineering program, which has been on the verge of turning away new students for lack of space.

The Legislature already had provided funding in the 1990s and 2000s to rebuild two sections of Berndt Hall, which houses science programs. But the third and final section, which includes the engineering, physics and geosciences programs, has gone begging for money throughout the recession.

Fort Lewis officials were confident all year that this was the year for Berndt Hall, and the Legislature’s Capital Development Committee and the Colorado Commission on Higher Education identified Berndt as the second-highest priority college construction project in the state.

But Fort Lewis backers were shocked when the budget committee knocked the college off the list last month. Many legislators rebelled against the move, and colleges across the state backed a plan to fund Fort Lewis and other schools this September, as long as an improving economy leaves the state with money in the bank at the end of its fiscal year June 30.

But then in the Senate, Minority Leader Bill Cadman, R-Colorado Springs, passed an amendment to give Fort Lewis $10 million this summer, at the expense of funding for an Advanced Industries program in the governor’s office.

The Joint Budget Committee decided to keep the $10 million payment to Fort Lewis in place, and they balanced the books by taking $5 million each from the Advanced Industries program and a building at Western State Colorado University, which had vaulted ahead of Fort Lewis during a scramble to rewrite the construction budget last month.

The plan gives Gov. John Hickenlooper the $5 million he had originally requested for the Advanced Industries program, which provides funding for high-tech businesses to collaborate with universities on new products.

The House is expected to pass the budget bill today and send it to Hickenlooper for final approval.

jhanel@durangoherald.com



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