A biotechnology incubator lab and research center in Westchester County, a cloud computing center in Dutchess County and a high-risk assessment clinic for autistic children in Sullivan County are the top-priority projects for which the Mid-Hudson Regional Economic Development Council seeks millions of dollars in state funding.
The council cited the projects in its completed strategic plan to create jobs and grow the seven-county region”™s diverse economy over the next five years.
The 87-page plan, hammered together in less than three months by more than 100 volunteers meeting in a dozen working groups, will compete in Albany with strategic plans submitted by nine other regional councils across the state for an initial $200 million in funding. Regions judged among the top four plans each will receive $40 million in capital grants and employer tax credits. The awards are due to be announced in December.
In Westchester, about $11 million from that winner”™s pot would be applied to the development of incubator space for private biotech companies at New York Medical College in Valhalla. The private medical college is spending about $12.55 million to convert a vacant 120,000-square-foot building at the Grasslands medical campus for use as a regional center for disaster medicine and emerging infections, including preparedness for terrorist attacks and pandemics and treatments for chemical, biologic, radiologic and nuclear agents. The college operates the only U.S. lab that produces high-growth seed viruses for the production of influenza vaccines.
The college needs $11 million to complete the biotech incubator space and leverage additional federal funds, mid-Hudson council members said in their plan. They said the enterprise, already backed by a consortium of private biotech and pharmaceutical companies, will stimulate partnerships and job creation among numerous biotech companies in this region and around the state.
In a priority project that would especially help small and mid-sized businesses, the council wants to create a cloud computing center at Marist College in Poughkeepsie that would build on the work and expertise of IBM Corp. in that fast-growing computer services field.
By providing self-service and pay-on-demand information technology infrastructure and services over the Internet, cloud computing allows smaller companies to grow their businesses without the “distractions and expense” of building their own in-house IT infrastructure, according to the council plan.
Council members said making the region a national leader in cloud computing will protect the 1,463 IT businesses and about 20,000 jobs in IT-related occupations in the region and create many new ones in the field.
In Harris in Sullivan County, the council has targeted a high-risk assessment clinic for autistic children at the Center for Discovery as another priority project for state funding. The project in its $14-million first phase will create about 200 jobs at a facility with 32 short-term-stay beds serving 150 to 200 children annually. Designed to keep autistic children in their home school districts and avoid lifelong placement in institutions, the clinic would reduce the state”™s high costs ”“ more than $1.85 billion over the past five years ”“ for residents institutionalized at both in-state and out-of-state facilities.
