The board of directors for Connecticut’s government-run venture capital fund unanimously approved a $291 million deal Thursday with Jackson Laboratory, a Maine nonprofit, to subsidize its development of a facility on the campus of the UConn Health Center.
The General Assembly passed legislation giving the venture fund, Connecticut Innovations, authority over the Connecticut Bioscience Collaboration Program at the October jobs session.
Gov. Dannel Malloy, who championed the deal with Jackson, will hold a signing ceremony for the legislation at noon.
Malloy signed the bill into law in November.
The Jackson Laboratory of Bar Harbor, Maine, does genetic research and develops mice with human diseases to be used in biomedical research. The Connecticut facility will branch out into genomic medicine, a new area for Jackson.
Jackson projects it will employ an average of 343.75 people in Connecticut over the next 20 years. State support of $291 million amounts to an annual subsidy of $42,327.27 per job.
Interest costs are expected to make the total value of the deal more than $400 million.
The CI board had to first approve operating procedures for the Connecticut Bioscience Collaboration Program. The procedures outline the 20 parts of an application for funding and the process the board will follow when awarding money through the program.
According to CI, Jackson was the only applicant for the funding.
For-profit companies could not apply for the subsidies because the legislation excludes them.
John Stafstrom Jr., a lawyer with Pullman & Comley who represented CI during negotiations with Jackson, told the board the deal gives CI certain rights to use research developed by Jackson.
According to Stafstrom, the agreement with Jackson includes a $145 million loan for the facility and $46.7 million for furniture, fixtures and equipment.
Stafstrom said the funding documents for the deal went through 12 versions before coming to the board for approval.
Department of Economic and Community Development Commissioner Catherine Smith, who chairs the CI board, said the agreement should remain exempt from public disclosure until it is signed because of trade secrets and “other competition.”
At least one director, Raphael Santiago, was unavailable for the meeting because he was traveling out of state. Some directors did not attend the meeting, but participated by phone.
Jackson also has a location in Sacramento and is part of a consortium that recently received approval to build a genetic engineering and research facility in New York City.
A plan to build in Florida similar to the current arrangement in Connecticut unraveled because the state could not provide $100 million in incentives to the lab.
Jackson announced the end of its Florida plan on June 3 and announced Connecticut’s interest in a location on Sept. 30.
The Malloy Administration’s recruitment of Jackson began idiosyncratically with chief of staff Tim Bannon reading about the doomed Florida plan at his family’s Maine vacation home near Bar Harbor.
The administration sees the recruitment of Jackson as an early success of its plan to invest $864 million in the University of Connecticut Health Center, a project known as Bioscience Connecticut.
“By investing in a smart, strategic project like Bioscience Connecticut, as we did in May, the state sent a loud and clear message around the world to companies and research institutes like Jackson Laboratory that we are ready, willing and able to be a partner in this up-and-coming industry,” Malloy said.
All Jackson Labs has to do is create and sustain 300 jobs in ten years; $291 Million… that comes to about $970,000.00 per job. Is the governor that generous? Hell, I’ll settle for half that. How about it, Malloy? Cut me a cashier’s check for $485,000 and I’ll wear a white lab coat for eight hours a day and be the poster boy for your economic stimulus for the next ten years. Think about it Dan’l…and you don’t have to go dowsing for jobs in Davos Switzerland either. That must have been a harrowing saga for you… but it was worth the press release, wasn’t it?
There’s one teensy problem, Dan’l… we’re still unemployed… and none of the jobs boasted have materialized.
I do have a question though, Dan’l… if you’re so dedicated to stimulating work why don’t you do something that will actually help the 154,525 people currently counted as unemployed? Now, don’t start telling me about the jobless rate falling because we both know that’s a fallacy… because during November, when that rate fell a tidy 0.3 percent the state actually LOST 1,300 jobs… so tell me Dan’l, why is it that you call that a good thing? Do you believe that around 5,500 Connecticut residents giving up looking for work in one month is a good thing? Happy thoughts though Dan’l, you created 300 jobs at only $970,000.00 per job.
You know something Dan’l… I don’t think you give the slightest DAMN about the folks stuck on unemployment… and even less for those who have become statistically invisible. I very seriously doubt that any of us would be qualified to fill those jobs that the taxpayer helped create at $970,000.00 apiece. In fact, I’ll just bet we’ll be seeing people coming in from out of state to fill them, am I correct, Dan’l? You probably just want the Connecticut jobless to stay out of sight, don’t you Dan’l? Connecticut is sending all sorts of loud and clear messages Dan’l… and some of those are to the people languishing within its borders… and they ain’t very nice messages.. Think about this Dan’l… for the measly sum of $31 Million, you could buy a one way bus ticket for every unemployed person to any part of the country each chooses and really get us out of the way. Wouldn’t that be swell, Dan’l? Think of it as spring cleaning Dan’l… or perhaps more appropriately, extermination. Send us rats and roaches elsewhere.
While you’re lavishing sweetheart deals for ego boosting headline makers like Jackson Labs, and brokering mafia-like arrangements with public unions like SEIU and pantomime concessions from SEBAC that precipitate yet another deficit that will undoubtedly be shoved right down the throat of the taxpayer, you’re sticking small businesses with burdensome mandates that discourage hiring. That sends a clear message to the jobless which is anything but “we want you to find a job here”. Additionally you have hit the taxpayer with the highest tax increase in state history while failing (refusing?) to bring the size of government down to an affordable level… which is basically thumbing your nose at every working class family struggling to make ends meet and whose pockets you’re digging deeper into.
Hell, when you were screwing income tax refund recipients with a debit card you couldn’t even use an in-state bank??? Do you hold such a level of contempt for Connecticut businesses that you refuse to avail yourself of their services? How the hell do you expect them to stay in business if their very governor sets the precedent of outsourcing for every service to be rendered? The union thugs used to strong-arm support for the forced unionization of PCAs and home day care providers were from out of state. You mean we don’t have anyone qualified to be a mafioso thug within this state? I’d think the prison system would have plenty well qualified to do your dirty work, Dan’l. I have to assume that you don’t like businesses in this state all that much. Am I far from the mark?
You’re taking much needed money out of the private sector economy and effectively keeping your boot on the throat of any possible recovery. You’re not a dumb person, Dan’l so I have to assume that you’re doing this on purpose. I guess an intelligent and perceptive man such as yourself can guess exactly what I think of you.
Enjoy your job while you still have it, Dan’l.