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Job Cuts Won't Keep Alzheimer's Center Going, CEO Says

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By ADAM EMERSON | The Tampa Tribune

Published: October 20, 2008

Updated: 10/20/2008 02:00 pm

TAMPA - The job cuts made at the Byrd Alzheimer's center helped save the troubled institute $2 million, but they won't be enough to sustain the enterprise for long, the center's chief executive officer told his board of directors today.

To succeed, CEO Stephen Klasko said, the Johnnie B. Byrd Sr. Alzheimer's Center and Research Institute must strategically invest in its science and clinical operations to bring in revenue and lure federal research dollars, in developers who can recruit private donors, and in alliances with companies eager to produce drug therapies for Alzheimer's.

The center is running off $15 million in reserves and only has enough cash to sustain itself for a couple of years or so.

With planned investments, bankrolled by the institute's available cash, the Byrd center could collect $20 million in grants from the National Institutes of Health within a few years, Klasko said. Klasko told directors that he'll soon provide more details on the investments.

"This is an opportunity to move forward and have Florida be the center for Alzheimer's research," said Klasko, who also is the University of South Florida's vice president for health sciences.

The center had been plodding along without any state money this fiscal year. In the spring, the institute's leaders gave up a year in state funding to preserve the center's independence and repel a takeover by the university.

The center's leaders had hoped to spread its reserves over the next few years and seek partnerships to stay in business. In June, they chose to affiliate with USF and turn the center's management over to the university.

In September, Klasko laid off 19 of the institute's 71 workers, most of them administrators. The move saved the center 40 percent of its costs for salaries and benefits.

In addition to new investments, Klasko said, the center aggressively will go after state funding, adding that he, USF President Judy Genshaft and Former Florida House Speaker Johnnie B. Byrd Jr. "will be holding hands and working together" to lobby lawmakers.

It was Johnnie Byrd who fought against a takeover by USF, arguing that the center needed to stay independent. He relented in June, agreeing to an alliance with the university as long as the institute could keep its status as a nonprofit corporation.

Reporter Adam Emerson can be reached at (813) 259-8285 or aemerson@tampatrib.com.

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