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New Jersey Beats Silent Retreat on Embryonic Stem Cell Research Center

By Peter J. Smith

TRENTON, New Jersey, June 25, 2008 (LifeSiteNews.com) - New Jersey state officials are quietly retreating from constructing a massive stem cell research center that would have used taxpayer money to finance embryonic stem cell research and possibly therapeutic human cloning.

According to New Jersey's Star-Ledger, eight months after a much feted groundbreaking for the Stem Cell Institute of New Jersey took place, the area still remains a gravel parking lot with a sign featuring a picture of the proposed 18-story building. The building would have centralized the research of at least 50 scientists experimenting with human embryos.

The $150 million project, however, is dying a slow death as officials have not been able to come up with ways to circumvent the New Jersey voters' rejection of a $450 million bond that would have financed the construction of the building.

In October 2007, NJ Governor Jon Corzine proudly proclaimed "to the future!" as he and others put spades in the dirt to break ground for what was to be called the Christopher Reeve Pavilion. Weeks later, voters, frustrated with the state's failure to close a $3 billion budget gap, rejected the $450 million dollar ballot initiative to fund the project.

At first officials insisted the New Brunswick research facility would proceed as planned, using finances earmarked for other construction projects. However, in November officials in the cash-strapped state backed away from that idea, considered by many to be a slap in the face to voters.

Now the project has been put on indefinite hold.

Pro-life advocates with New Jersey Right to Life and the Catholic Church in New Jersey had waged an aggressive campaign to inform voters about the difference between ethical adult stem cell research and embryonic stem cell research, which, besides being morally questionable and having no proven benefits, would also heap enormous costs on an already bloated budget deficit for New Jersey citizens.

Today, reports the Star-Ledger, the Stem Cell Institute of New Jersey is just a web page with lab research ongoing in three existing locations. Currently 50 faculty members with the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey and Rutgers University are engaging in grant-funded stem cell research through the institute.

Marie Tasy, executive director of New Jersey Right to Life, has encouraged pro-life advocates to continue to remind government officials that they must abandon the project completely.

"Please continue to contact your state legislators and urge them to permanently abandon this project and use the $150M to pay down the debt.  Remind them that the people have spoken through the defeat of the $450M stem cell referendum," Tasy told supporters. "The New Brunswick facility was slated to perform research on human embryos derived from fertility labs and the [somatic cell nuclear transfer] cloning method which is immoral as well as impractical."

See the Star-Ledger report:

State pulls back on stem cell funding
http://www.nj.com/newark/index.ssf/2008/06/state_pulls_back_on_stem_cell.html

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