Researchers will relocate to new state-of-the-art plaza from 30-year-old trailers

Health sciences researchers now working out of trailers will soon have a state-of-the-art $170 million home.

The Arizona Board of Regents approved earlier this month a $170 million plan to expand the Arizona Health Sciences Center that will replace old facilities and provide adequate facilities for biotechnology research.

The plan calls for an expansion of existing infrastructure, as well as the construction of a $60 million medical research building, the first structure to be built in a massive medical plaza.

That plaza will consume virtually all property south of University Medical Center to Speedway Boulevard, between Campbell Avenue and Cherry Avenue.

The medical research building is slated to be built on the southwest corner of Warren Avenue and Mabel Street, near the College of Pharmacy.

By giving their nod of approval, the regents gave UA officials permission to begin the final stage of planning for the building, which will hold 48 faculty and 120 support staff and students, some of whom will be working on biotechnology.

"We have to cross our fingers that the state comes through with some money," -Joel Valdez senior vice president for business affairs

Joel Valdez, senior vice president for business affairs, said the next step in the planning process is to hire an architect for the building.

The new build will replace several 30-year-old structures that were originally intended to be temporary housing for UMC's many employees.

President Peter Likins called the building a vital addition because the faculty and research technicians in the temporary, trailer-like buildings needed proper facilities to keep their morale high.

He said keeping faculty in sub-par working conditions is as bad as giving UA employees salaries far below the average for its peer institutions.

The building will house scientists who will develop treatments to many diseases, said Dr. Ray Woosley, vice president for health sciences.

Woosley said studies on neurobiology of aging and degenerative disease, vascular biology, organ engineering and cell therapeutics, molecular genetics, molecular imaging and molecular cancer therapeutics have already been scheduled to be housed in the building.

Those studies will bring in a projected $100 million in research grant revenue to UA, Woosley said.

Likins said the building will be the first of two structures to be built in the new medical plaza, which will house people who work in the medical college.

Likins said UA will wait to build the second building to make sure the first can generate enough money to turn a profit.

The plaza will also have two buildings reserved for outside researchers doing genetic research.

The building's cost will be absorbed by $30 million in system revenue bonds and another $30 million in gifts, Valdez said.

He also said the new structure should pay for itself by bringing in grants and outside research.

"That money is coming in, but we're bound and determined not to start until the money is in the bank," Valdez said.

Likins also said the project would not proceed with a lack of necessary funds, but emphasized the importance of the building by saying that other projects would be put on hold to expedite the construction of the facility.

Although the building is essentially paid for, a significant portion of the $170.3 million cost for the entire plaza must come from state-allocated funds, a fact that has some UA officials worried.

"We have to cross our fingers that the state comes through with some money," Valdez said.

Likins said he is also concerned that Arizona legislators won't give the university the funding it needs to make the medical plaza a reality.

"If the state doesn't have the wisdom to do that, we'll find some way to do that," Likins said.