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Senate advances $500,000 maintenance-and-operations request for Utah State biotechnology facility
Summary
The Utah Senate adopted a committee report and placed Senate Bill 162 — a roughly $500,000 maintenance-and-operations appropriation to support biotechnology research at Utah State University — on the third‑reading calendar after the sponsor described the building’s near completion and future research role.
Senators on the Utah Senate floor on Feb. 10 advanced a measure to provide maintenance-and-operations funding for a biotechnology research facility at Utah State University.
Senator Leonard M. Blackham, reporting the Energy, Natural Resources, and Agriculture Committee’s recommendation, described Senate Bill 162 as an appropriation to finance operations once the university’s biotech building is finished "this year and ... ready to roll." He told colleagues the fiscal note is "a half a million dollars" and said the Department of Agriculture would contract with Utah State to carry out agricultural biotechnology research if the appropriation is approved.
The bill, Blackham said, responds to multi-year investment already put into the facility and aims to keep Utah agriculture competitive by funding research into diseases and other agricultural applications. "Biotechnology is the really the powerful tool that's gonna make this happen in the future," Blackham said on the floor.
After brief floor discussion the question was called for third reading and the clerk announced that SB 162 "shows 23 ayes"; the bill was placed on the third‑reading calendar.
Next steps: SB 162 is scheduled for third reading, where the chamber will consider final passage or further amendment.
