New Jersey Gets a Stimulus Package of Its Own, Courtesy of Rutgers U.

Rutgers University says it will create “thousands of badly needed construction jobs” throughout New Jersey with a $500-million construction program that it announced Thursday. The university says 20 building projects on its campuses will employ 5,000 people through 2011.

“As the federal stimulus plan demonstrates, infrastructure improvements are an important way to create jobs and lay the foundation for long-term economic growth,” said the university’s president, Richard L. McCormick. “On the state level, Rutgers University can play a similar role as an economic engine across New Jersey.”

Included in the program are:
$25-million for an Institute for Health Sciences on the New Brunswick campus.
$12-million in renovations to the recreational center on the Camden campus.
$5.4-million to construct additional research laboratories in the Life Sciences Center on the Newark campus.
$55-million for a new Center for Integrative Proteomics Technologies facility on the Busch campus in Piscataway.
$18.2-million to expand the Livingston campus’s student center in Piscataway.
$60-million for deferred maintenance across the university.
$15-million for classroom improvements.

Rutgers says it can afford the program because of “prudent fiscal policies” and strong credit ratings that allowed it to sell $233.1-million in bonds earlier this month.