Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SUNDAY, May 2, 1993                   TAG: 9305030267
SECTION: EDITORIAL                    PAGE: F-3   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: KEN WOODLEY
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

TALL, BUT NOT ENOUGH TO SEE FROM

I refer, of course, to the new state office building that will be constructed for about $18 million in Richmond at the corner of 9th and Broad streets. A large edifice that will stand tall and may conjure up thoughts of good guys on white horses who always get the crooks in the end and ride off into the sunset, taking all the credit with them. Not a debit in site.

A building that will be, in every sense of the word, a building. A structure. A lasting monument to the lottery's ability to attract millions and millions of dollars from rural Virginians.

Now, let's be honest because - as we know so very, very, very well - honesty is what makes our government go round. The only shadiness connected with the General Assembly are the trees surrounding the hallowed halls where squirrels search for nuts and where noble men and women gather to preserve our life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Whose happiness remains a question, but happiness in some way, shape or form, is being pursued. General Assembly members, we know, are faster than a speeding bullet and able to leap tall buildings in a single bound. More powerful than a locomotive, too.

Speaking of tall buildings and leaping and all that, the lottery building looks to be rather tallish, more than eight stories, with a picturesque tower-thing in one corner. A caveat: The lottery building is not to be confused with the Capitol. The lottery building may be a capital building but it is no Capitol building.

I understand a lot of deals were cut - rather than paper dolls or playing cards - to acquire sufficient legislative support to get the lottery building through the General Assembly during the recent veto session. I hope that amongst all that deal-making someone suggested - and rather firmly and with a knowing look in his or her eye - that legislators would now be able to support the return of some lottery proceeds to localities.

Meanwhile, the Center On Rural Development was given several hundred thousand dollars to spread statewide among all the many rural localities needing development so badly. Let's see: $18 million for a lottery office building and $350,000 for the Center On Rural Development's statewide efforts.

Now I don't mean to suggest that the Center On Rural Development is being shortchanged by state government. Not at all. The Center On Rural Development has apparently been provided with an answering machine. I called and left a message and thus assume the answering machine to be on, in some way, the property of the Center On Rural Development. So the state does care about the Center On Rural Development.

Let's see:

$18 million for a lottery office building, tallish with a tower-thing, and:

An answering machine for the Center On Rural Development.

But what an effective machine it is. It records your message and plays it back later to someone who does return your call. So the answering machine is a thoughtful tool for rural Virginia and I am glad rural Virginia has been so thoughtfully provided. If the state didn't care about rural Virginia, there would be no answer at all.

It's quite possible that the lottery department needs more office space. Perhaps constructing this new building is the cheapest and best answer. A few other agencies will probably be provided space in the lottery building, allowing our government to say, "It's not a lottery building. It's a new state office building."

Terrific. We're all very impressed.

I may be trying to ride wild, rural horses, but let's have a bill passed next year returning a share of the lottery proceeds to localities that see so much of their citizens' cash spent on lottery tickets.

And let's see the adequate funding for the Center On Rural Development, which is, quite honestly, beginning to do good things despite insufficient support.

And there's a crazy little thing called disparity, too, and a defunct shell-building program, and a collander-like Literary Loan Fund and . . .

From atop the new lottery building one won't be able to see rural Virginia, but that is not the building's purpose.

Ken Woodley is editor of The Farmville Herald.