A dozen states are competing intensely to play host to a government research lab full of killer germs like anthrax, avian flu and foot-and-mouth disease – a prospect some of their residents want to avoid like the plague.

The states are bidding for a proposed 520,000-square-foot National Bio- and Agro-Defense Facility that will cost at least $450 million to build. It would replace an aging, smaller lab at Plum Island, N.Y., where security lapses after the 2001 terrorist attacks drew scrutiny from Congress and government investigators. The Homeland Security Department facility promises at least 300 lab-related jobs, and more in construction.

Texas has a total of four sites in contention. Other states bidding for the site are California, Georgia, Kansas, Oklahoma, Maryland, Mississippi, Missouri, North Carolina and Wisconsin. Georgia, Kansas and Mississippi are offering two sites each, while Kentucky and Tennessee are working together for one site in Kentucky.

In June, officials will narrow down their options to three to five sites. The winner should be announced in October 2008, with the lab operating by 2014.

Read (AP via Central Florida News 13)

*I can’t believe that Virginia passed up an opportunity and didn’t offer a site.*