New York State Slates $2.25M for First Law School in Rochester
Posted on: Friday, 11 April 2008, 09:00 CDT
By Elizabeth Stull
Fairport's St. John Fisher College could be home to the first law school in Rochester, thanks to $2.25 million in state funds slated for the project -- which until now had been little more than a gleam in the college president's eye.
Fisher spokeswoman Anne Greer said school officials hope the state funds secured Tuesday by Sen. Joseph E. Robach, R-Greece, will help to attract an additional $6 to $8 million, minimum, required for the project.
Greer emphasized Wednesday that the college is still researching the concept of a law school and discussing details such as location, tuition and number of students, is premature.
"We're just trying to find out if we would be a viable player in that kind of arena," she said. "We have determined that there would be a need."
St. John Fisher currently has almost 3,700 students in its undergraduate, master's and doctoral programs. It would be one of the smallest schools in the state to host a law school. The other Upstate law schools are linked to large research universities at Cornell, Syracuse and Buffalo. A fourth, Albany Law School, is not affiliated with a college or university.
Fisher has doctoral programs in education and pharmacy, and is now seeking approval for its graduate nursing program. Its undergraduate pre-law program is well-respected locally, and in 2002 Fisher alumni formed the Justinian Order, which represents more than 400 judges, lawyers and other legal professionals.
"Fisher has done some very clever program niche development," said Mary Corbett, executive director of the Monroe County Bar Association and an alumna of the college. "A lot people go on to law school and are highly celebrated members of the legal community."
Corbett said "it would be terrific" to have a law school in Rochester: "It brings another element to the legal community."
Robach said the idea for a law school was presented to him by Fisher President Donald Bain, and that it "became even more of a win when they wanted to utilize existing space in downtown Rochester."
Makua Matua, interim dean of the State University of New York at Buffalo Law School said earlier this week that the state already has too many law schools and is not fully supporting the public law school at Buffalo.
Responding to such objections, Robach maintains that huge investments were made in public universities, and a law school here would draw people and dollars from outside of the immediate area. He said Matua should focus on influencing his own legislative representatives.
"There's no reason why we can't bring more money in from other regions," Robach said.
He added that area residents should be able to attend law school part time, or at least without commuting an hour or more. "There is also the SUNY capital budget," he noted.
"We're investing in education all over New York State, heavily in the Rochester area," Robach said. "We're very fortunate to have public and private options for people."
Other anticipated capital expenditures include:
* $50 million for the University of Rochester's Clinical and Translational Science Institute; ($25 million each from the Assembly and executive capital budgets);
* $12 million for the Rochester Institute of Technology's Golisano Institute for Sustainability ($10 million from the Senate and $2 million from the Assembly), and $1.2 million for RIT's Center for Integrated Manufacturing Studies. The budget also included $1 million for RIT's Pollution Prevention Institute;
* $8 million for municipal parking, as part of Rochester's "CityGate" project;
* $10 million for the Monroe County crime lab.
The SUNY capital budget provides $34 million for an academic field house under construction at the State University of New York in Brockport.
Originally published by Elizabeth Stull.
(c) 2008 Daily Record (Rochester, NY). Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning. All rights Reserved.
Source: Daily Record (Rochester, NY)
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