Government

Tracking NBAF: National Bio And Agro-Defense Facility Takes Shape In Kansas

In 2005, the Department of Homeland Security announced plans to replace the old Plum Island Animal Disease Center off Long Island with a facility on the U.S. mainland to study Foot and Mouth Disease and other dangerous pathogens. Kansas won the job in 2008, with a site on the campus of Kansas State University in Manhattan.But today, more than three years later, the proposed $1.14 billion National Bio- and Agro-Defense Facility faces funding obstacles, safety questions, rising costs and political fallout. For Kansas and the Midwest, the stakes couldn’t be higher.Here you’ll find coverage and updates from Harvest Public Media, KCUR and Kansas Public Media.

Senate Committee Advances NBAF Funding

KCUR | By Stephen Koranda

Published July 19, 2013 at 8:10 AM CDT

Architectural rendering of NBAF building. President Obama has decided not to fund construction of the huge animal disease lab in Kansas next year.

Kansas Senators Jerry Moran and Pat Roberts say funding for a federal lab to be built in Manhattan has passed an important hurdle.

The National Bio and Agro-Defense Facility, or NBAF, will study diseases that could be used to attack the nation's food supply. A Senate subcommittee voted earlier this week to approve more than $400 million for the lab.

Moran says that a full Senate committee has now also voted to approve the funding.

“It is a determining factor in NBAF’s future,” says Moran.

Moran says because the House and Senate have approved the same amount of funding, the proposal likely would not be changed in any eventual negotiations between the chambers.

The total projected cost of the lab is more than $1 billion.