BINGHAMTON, NY – Gov. Andrew Cuomo will include $10 million dollars in his 2014-2015 executive budget proposal for Binghamton University to begin site acquisition and design work for a School of Pharmaceutical Sciences and Pharmacy, State Sen. Thomas W. Libous and Binghamton University President Harvey Stenger announced today.

"We all have been talking about a School of Pharmaceutical Sciences and Pharmacy and Harvey, the governor and I have had a number of conversations about moving forward and accelerating it," said Libous. "The governor has reached out to me that he will be putting $10 million into his budget proposal on Tuesday, part of an overall $60-million investment. We see this as a couple-year process, but we believe that with the governor’s support we’re on a fast track. He made it very clear to me that this is the real deal."

"Our current plan is to have 300 students when we’re fully enrolled – 240 DPharm students and another 60 PhD students when we’re up and running," said Binghamton University President Harvey Stenger. "We’ll initially hire about 12 clinical and 12 research faculty, and with the additional graduate students, it will make a nice community, create jobs and attract research dollars."

The school will most likely be built in Johnson City, Libous said, and will be an economic driver for the community. When complete, the building is expected to be about 70,000 gross square feet.

"A school of pharmacy requires hospital rotations for its students, so we thought it best to locate the new school near a hospital," said Stenger. "This a critical announcement because we’ve been talking for months about space and, when we are so tight for space on campus, this answers a very big question for us.

Binghamton submitted its Letter of Intent to SUNY to establish the school in September 2013, and will submit its full proposal this spring. Approval will allow Binghamton to develop only the second public school of pharmacy in New York state. The University at Buffalo already offers a pharmacy program.