April 12, 2006
Pioneer Press
The House is scheduled to vote today on its biggest bill of the session, a measure that would finance $999.9 million in construction projects across the state.
The bonding bill, which would authorize borrowing $949 million and charging user fees to pay the rest, would pay for college classroom and laboratory buildings, parks and trails, bridges and dams and prisons and hospitals for sex offenders.
The bill could determine the fate of such high-profile projects as the Central Corridor light-rail line between the St. Paul and Minneapolis downtowns; additions to prisons in Stillwater, Faribault and Shakopee; and the first step in a 10-year, $366 million plan to build biomedical sciences research laboratories at the University of Minnesota.
Barring a big surprise, the House will pass the bill and send it to a House-Senate conference committee, where negotiators will try to resolve differences between that measure and the Senate's $1 billion capital projects bill. Gov. Tim Pawlenty had proposed spending $931 million on capital improvements.
View the entire story at: http://www.twincities.com/mld/twincities/news/politics/capitol/14320942.htm
Posted by reas0011 at April 12, 2006 10:58 AM