Stem cell agency forced to delay $58M in grants

The country's moribund bond market has forced California's stem cell agency to delay $58 million in new grants earmarked to train researchers, moments after the group approved them. Six San Francisco area labs, including one at Stanford University, will have to wait until March before the state agency can review the market and release the funds.

Board members have approved $700 million in grants so far, out of $3 billion approved by voters. But the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine says that the group has enough funds to meet its commitments through this September.

Meanwhile, the Los Angeles Times is reporting that Democrats and Republicans are competing for a top leadership position at CIRM. Democrats want Art Torres (photo), the outgoing chief of the California Democratic Party, to take the vice chairman's position at CIRM. But Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger is backing Republican biotech executive Duane Roth (photo). The dispute is growing particularly heated as the CIRM adds new salaries for its leaders.

- read the report in the San Francisco Chronicle
- read the story in the Los Angeles Times

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