Published July 1991 — Download PDF of the original newspaper column
Byrd's-Eye View By U.S. Senator Robert C. Byrd Appropriations for High Technology Development in West Virginia To advance high technology frontiers in West Virginia, and to help broaden our state's economic base, I recently added $29.5 million to a Senate appropriation bill. The purpose of these funds is to build three facilities in West Virginia sponsored by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), including $10 million to establish a center in Fairmont, Marion County, to test computer software used by NASA aerospace programs. This center, to be built for NASA by West Virginia University, would be used by contractors to consolidate testing and verification of vital software used by NASA. The work to be conducted at this new facility, called an Independent Verification and Validation (IV&V) center, would help to ensure that the software produced for NASA by contractors will function accurately on the ground and in flight, with the goal of improving the efficiency of the national aerospace program. When completed, the proposed 41,000-squarefoot NASA facility would house up to 200 contractor employees. In addition, I have added $19.5 million for two ongoing NASA projects at Wheeling Jesuit College. This sum includes $13.5 million to construct and equip the National Technology Transfer Center and $6 million to construct, equip, and link students at Wheeling Jesuit College to the NASA Classroom of the Future. These two projects are designed ''to bring NASA technology down to earth." The Technology Transfer Center is intended to improve the competitive capabilities of U.S. and West Virginia businesses by affording them access to the latest developments in high technology, while the purpose of the Classroom of the Future is to use NASA technology and development to promote and teach mathematics, science, and engineering. These three NASA related programs advance my goal of promoting high technology opportunities in West Virginia; opportunities that can put our state on the cutting edge of twenty-first century economic growth and create broad new job and career possibilities for young West Virginians in the years ahead. July 17, 1991