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Rocky Mountain Labs unveils preliminary plans for new bio-hazard lab in Hamilton

In developing one of the premier biological research facilities in the country,
Rocky Mountain Laboratories is soliciting comment from the community.

By JENNY JOHNSON Ravalli Republic Staff Reporter

A highly secure lab will be constructed at the Hamilton campus in the next
couple of years. Part of the public process of constructing the estimated $67
million lab, a biosafety level 4 facility that can house the most dangerous
pathogens such as smallpox, ebola or hantavirus, includes gathering public input
about the lab’s construction and effects on the environment.

That’s what officials are hoping to do at an open house Monday at the Hamilton
Community Center at 5:30 p.m.

Ecosystem Research Group of Missoula was hired to prepare an environmental
assessment that documents impacts of the lab’s construction as part of the
National Environmental Policy Act. The firm is looking for biological, social and
economic impacts the lab’s construction may cause as well as how it affects
transportation, planning and local governments, according to Gibson Hartwell of
Ecosystem Research Group.

"The more public feedback we get the better the document," he said.

Hartwell said his company will solicit comment at Monday’s meeting and collect
comments posted on their Web site, which has become a valuable tool in
gathering public input on other projects. The firm, which was contracted by MCS
Environmental, will also ask Ravalli County officials and the city of Hamilton to
chime in on possible effects to planning and public services. The environmental
assessment will be available for review Aug. 16. To comment online, go to
http://www.ecosystemrg.com/projectwebsites.html

Monday’s meeting will involve an open house with officials concerned with
planning, architecture and science available to answer questions, according to
Pat Stewart, the lab’s chief administrator.

"There will be people there to answer questions and explain where we are in the
project," she said.

From 5:30 p.m. to 7 p.m. Monday, people can browse the preliminary designs of
the new lab, which is planned to be constructed in the center of RML’s campus
near downtown Hamilton. At 7 p.m., officials will present the plan for the new
building and outline the construction timeline. Stewart will also talk about issues
brought up at a public meeting in February during which neighbors voiced
concerns over the aesthetics of the whole campus, she said. Those concerns
about aesthetic issues are being addressed in a separate project, and the
meeting will be targeted at gathering input for the environmental assessment, she
said.

As part of the National Institutes of Health, Rocky Mountain Laboratories has a
leadership role in researching agents of potential bioterrorism, and President
Bush directed the institute be funded to expand such research after the anthrax
incidents late last year.

Construction on the new lab should begin next year and be completed by 2005.
With the new facility, laboratory scientists will be able to expand research not
allowed at the biosafety level 2 and 3 labs that exist on campus – an exciting
prospect for scientists who strive to discover characteristics of infectious
diseases that could lead to vaccines or cures.

There are four biosafety level 4 labs in the country, and none west of Texas,
although there are several on the drawing board, according to federal officials.
This type of lab uses several measures to make sure that infectious agents are
contained or destroyed, including positive-pressure air supply, chemical
decontamination and decontamination at high temperature of all materials
produced in the facility. While federal officials are in the process of upgrading the
entire security system at the lab, the level 4 lab will have its own stringent
security measures that limit access.

Expanding RML’s ability to research is expected to bring an estimated 65
scientists to the area and an expanded support staff.

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