Posted on behalf of Amber Dance

The competition over which city will host the new US National Bio and Agro-Defense Facility is getting dirty, with recent allegations of politicians playing favorites.

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) disregarded the advice of carefully selected experts to put a Flora, Mississippi, site on the shortlist of candidates, the Associated Press said Monday. The implication is that powerful Mississippi politicians — Rep. Bennie Thompson (D) and Sen. Thad Cochran® — pushed DHS to consider their home state, despite other sites scoring higher in the expert evaluations. Both politicians deny the allegations, and DHS denies using a scoring system at all.

The lab, where scientists study diseases such as foot-and-mouth, is currently housed on Plum Island in Long Island Sound. But the lab is small and lacks Biosafety Level 4 capacity to work with the most dangerous pathogens. DHS is considering revamping the Plum Island lab, but has said a mainland facility would be cheaper to build and maintain, and scientists would be more likely to want to work at a lab that doesn’t require a commute by boat. The new lab is expected to cost $500 million (USA Today).

Starting with 29 applicant sites, the DHS looked at 17 in more detail. An agency panel ranked Flora 14th on that list, but it still made the final cut (Nature). The winning site will gain approximately 500 jobs, $1.6 million in tax revenue annually, and, of course, the unparalleled prestige that comes with hosting biological research (Athens Banner-Herald).

Now, other applicants are crying foul. “It is very suspicious,” said Irwin Goldman, whose Madison, Wisconsin, site failed to make the cut. State representative Marti Crow (D) of Leavenworth, Kansas, was angry that Flora’s score of 81 beat out Leavenworth’s 92 for a spot on the shortlist. “You get a good grade and get eliminated? That just isn’t fair,” Crow told the Lawrence Journal-World. In San Antonio, which also made the shortlist, Chamber of Commerce President Richard Perez said Texas would use its own political pressure if necessary (WOAI).

Mississippi’s Clarion-Ledger hit back, calling the criticism “sour grapes” and defending Flora as a prime location with room to expand and public support.

DHS is expected to make the final call late this year or early next, and the lab is slated to open in 2015.