What’s up with the stem cell money?

Reporter Karen Buckelew reports today that more than four months after the Maryland Stem Cell Research Commission announced recipients of its first $15 million in grants, the group still has not cut checks to any of the 24 winning projects.

Late paperwork from scientists and internal bureaucratic delays at universities are the main reasons.

Several commission members were angry. One, Suzanne Ostrand-Rosenberg, a professor of biological science at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, had a suggestion.

“If people don’t get all their paperwork in in six months, this offer is no longer open,” she said.

What do you think of her idea? What else should be done?

-TOM LINTHICUM, Executive Editor