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Saturday, March 07, 2009
Sen. Fischmann's Bill to Foster Technological Development Passes NM Senate
“During these hard economic times New Mexico must be creative and proactive in order to bring economic growth to our state. The Research Applications Act will help attract investment to drive technological innovation and create high paying jobs,” said Sen. Stephen H. Fischmann (D, Dona Ana & Sierra-37) in a statement released yesterday about Senate Bill 205. The bill was passed by a unanimous vote of the Senate, 32-0, and now goes to the House Business and Industry Committee for consideration.
SB 205 enacts the New Mexico Research Applications Act that establishes a nonprofit corporation to interact with business and government agencies, universities, private foundations and national laboratories to foster economic development in the areas of technology and intellectual property. The nonprofit corporation will work with the New Mexico Computing Applications Center initiative, Energy Innovation Fund, Water Innovation Fund, Technology Development and the Green Grid Initiative.
The Research Applications Center (RAC) will bring together technical resources from across the State to address the most promising technologies to drive economic development, including smart and green power grids, supercomputing and nanotechnology.
Under the bill a 14 member Board of Directors of the RAC would be created to conduct the business of the nonprofit corporation. The membership of the board, appointed by the governor and the legislature, will reflect the technical expertise available in the State as well as the State’s geographic, cultural and ethnic diversity.
March 7, 2009 at 11:20 AM in Economy, Populism, Green Economy, NM Legislature 2009 | Permalink
Comments
Another high salary work program for the cronies? Damn, I thought I was going to be able to actually BUILD something and pay my mortgage. Let me know when there is some real work to be done.
Posted by: qofdisks | Mar 7, 2009 2:50:17 PM
We need to utilize everything in out power to reduce our dependence on foreign oil including using our own natural resources.OPEC will continue to cut production until they achieve their desired 80-100. per barrel. The high cost of fuel this past year seriously damaged our economy and society. Oil is finite. We are using oil globally at the rate of 2X faster than new oil is being discovered. We need to take some of these billions in bail out bucks and bail ourselves out of our dependence on foreign oil. Jeff Wilson has a really good new book out called The Manhattan Project of 2009 Energy Independence Now. He explores our uses of oil besides gasoline, our depletion, out reserves and stores as well as viable options to replace oil.Oil is finite, it will run out in the not too distant future. We need to be more proactive and educate ourselves and others. The historic high price of gas this past year did serious damage to our economy and society. WE should never allow others to have that much power over our economy again. I wish every member of congress would read this book too.
www.themanhattanprojectof2009.com
Posted by: sherry | Mar 7, 2009 6:11:52 PM