The state Senate approved a bill to speed up BioStar funding by a one-vote margin Tuesday, one day after the Joint Finance Committee failed to approve the measure.
The Senate also passed a resolution commending UW-Madison researcher James Thomson for his work with embryonic stem cells.
Full state funding for the BioStar initiative would be provided to the university two years earlier than originally planned under the bill, which passed the Democrat-controlled Senate by a mostly party-line vote.
However, the Joint Finance Committee tied 8-8 along party lines when it voted on the measure Monday. The bill must pass the Republican-controlled Assembly before it can appear before Gov. Scott McCallum.
The bill would permit the university to take advantage of increases in private fund-raising resulting from publicity surrounding Thomson's research, according to Mike Browne, spokesperson for Senate Majority Leader Chuck Chvala. The BioStar initiative is a joint public-private program, and the measure passed Tuesday would allow state funding to keep pace if private funding increases, Browne said.
