Third time’s the charm for funding Albany State University new fine arts center

ALBANY — After 12 years of controversy about funding a new fine arts center at Albany State University, a stoke of a pen can write an ending when Gov. Nathan Deal signs off on Georgia’s $21 billion 2015-16 budget.

Included in the budget is $19.8 million to build a new multi-purpose academic center on campus.

Two years ago the University System of Georgia Board of Regents recommended including $26.8 million in the state’s FY 2015 budget to build a performing arts center at ASU. Gov. Nathan Deal, however, reduced the amount to $1.4 million for a redesign of the facility.

This past year the BOR recommended $19.8 for a multi-purpose academic building with no performing arts center, and many were hopeful that the university would finally get a facility to replace the current aging and over crowded Arts and Humanities center located at Holley Hall.

But once again, Deal pulled the funding from the supplemental budget.

Yet a week after the general assembly convened in January, old-fashioned politics came into play and the ASU funding was restored to the budget.

Why? Because of heavy lobbying by ASU Interim President Art Dunning, and Deal wanted votes. Deal needed Democratic support to reach the two-thirds majority in the Senate and the House required to get his Opportunity Schools referendum, the centerpiece of his education reform package, on the ballot in November of next year.

Sen Freddie-Powell Sims, D-Dawson, co-sponsored SB133 which dealt with giving the state the power to take over failing schools. She was the only Democrat to co-sponsor the Senate bill.

But funding for ASU’s multi-purpose academic facility was back in the budget.

“I am very hopeful (Deal) will sign the budget,” Powell-Sims said Friday. “Rep. (Winfred) Dukes (D-Albany) and I have been working hard the past two years to secure the funding for Albany State and I am grateful that the governor saw fit to place it back into the budget,” she said.

Needless to say, Powell-Sims caught heat from her caucus for supporting the Republicans’ Opportunity Schools bill.

“If you look at my voting record I tend to vote as to the wishes of my district and how it will impact my district,” Powell-Sims said. “If we can get legislators to think about everything in the state is inter-related, maybe some voting patterns will change.”

Dukes was pleased that the funding issue was finally off the table.

“I feel good about it, it’s a worthy project and long over-due,” Dukes said. “I think the legislature felt that Albany State had gotten $140 million after the flood of 1994, but this project needed to be funded for the good of the institution and the community. It’s really about economic development.

“But it was a good day for all of us who worked so diligently to get the funding.”

Freshman representative Darrel Ealum, D-Albany, who made funding for the project the centerpiece of his campaign last year, was was ecstatic about the funding.

“I can’t tell you how excited I am,” Ealum said. “Freddie took the lead and opened the door. The things I did to help make it happen would not have had much of an impact if she had not opened the door. I just helped close it behind us.”

Rep. Ed Rynders, R-Leesburg, said getting the project back into the budget might have actually benefited from the time it spent being bandied about by the BOR, general assembly and governor’s office.

“The project had been in discussions for sometime so there was really no need for members of the House and Senate to familiarize themselves with it,” Rynders said. “Freddie and (Rep.) Gerald Greene (R-Cuthbert) deserve much of the credit, but it really took a total team effort. I also think once the project was scaled back (From $26.8 to $19.8 million) it made the pathway to funding much easier.”

None of the legislators would speculate on when the project would actually begin, saying the governor must first sign the budget.