Recently, there was a proposal to have the state fund a new science museum in Albany. Rest assured that we are completely opposed to this proposal, nor do we see any likelihood that there will be funding in the state budget for it.
Albany already has the State Museum, the State Library, the Albany Institute of History and Art, The Times-Union Center, and the new state-subsidized Capital Convention Center. In addition, the city of Albany received $12.5 million in state funding this year to close a budget shortfall.
While Albany is the capital city and deserves our support, this idea goes too far.
Certainly the city of Schenectady has a far more historic relationship with science than Albany, and it doesn’t have to start from scratch. Less than 20 miles from Albany, it already has miSci (the Museum of Innovation and Science) that is currently only supported by the local community and would soar with state funding.
It’s neither realistic nor fair to the entire Capital Region to make a pie-in-the-sky proposal without a realistic sense of where the revenue is going to come from to fund it, especially when there are more viable alternatives available.
Angelo Santabarbara
Phil Steck
Schenectady
The writers are members of the New York State Assembly.
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Categories: Letters to the Editor, Opinion
