Tuesday, June 20, 2006

OBITUARY
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(Maryland) Rev. Thomas Byron Collins, S.J., 85, died June 17, 2006, at the Halquist Memorial Inpatient Center in Arlington, Va. He was Jesuit for 65 years and a priest for 53 years.

Father Byron Collins was born in Bradford, Pa., on August 16, 1920. Following graduation from St. Bernard's High School in Bradford, Pa., he attended Holy Cross College in Worcester, Mass., until the death of his father in 1938, when he returned to Bradford to administer the family’s business of oil production. On September 7, 1940, he entered the Society of Jesus at the Novitiate of St. Isaac Jogues in Wernersville, Pa. After pronouncing his First Vows on September 8, 1942, he pursued Juniorate (College) studies at Wernersville from 1942 to 1943, and was then sent to study philosophy at Woodstock College, Md., from 1943 to 1946.

As a Jesuit Scholastic, Father Collins taught English and French at Georgetown Prep in North Bethesda, Md., from 1946 to 1949.  He then pursued studies in theology at Weston College in Weston, Mass., from 1949 to 1953, and was ordained at Weston College Chapel by the Most Rev. Richard J. Cushing, archbishop of Boston, on June 21, 1952.  Following his theological studies, he made his Tertianship at the Jesuit Martyrs Shrine at Auriesville, N.Y., from 1953 to 1954, and his Final Profession in the Society of Jesus was made at the Georgetown University Chapel on April 22, 1978.

After completing his training as a Jesuit, Father Collins was appointed to Georgetown University, where he held administrative positions from 1954 until his death. During his first five years at Georgetown he was the physical plant administrator, which included responsibility for construction on the three campuses of the university. During those years he oversaw the building of a wing for the hospital, a diagnostic center (Gorman Building), quarters for the School of Foreign Service (the Edmund A. Walsh Building) and the Nursing School (St. Mary's Hall), and dormitories for undergraduates (New South) and medical/dental students (Kober/Cogan). In 1959, he was named vice president for business management. The newly created office was to coordinate and supervise all business personnel and operations, including planning and construction. Over the next decade Father Collins secured funding, through federal grants and loans, foundation support, and private gifts, for two dormitories (Harbin and Darnall), a new Law Center, a Concentrated Care Center, library, children's diagnostic center (Bles Building), Basic Science Building, Dental Clinic, and power plant. In that 15-year period, the university put up more construction than it had in its previous 165 years.

Father Collins was then appointed special assistant to the president for federal relations. As President Henle noted in making the appointment, he wanted to take advantage of Father Collins' "very special talent in congressional and federal relation." The position, which evolved into the Office of Federal Relations, proved to be the perfect fit for Father Collins.

Father Collins had realized early on the important source that the federal government had become for development in higher education. In 1956, with the help of Speaker John McCormack and Senator Wayne Morse, he secured a special bill that provided $2 million in grants for the construction of the Gorman Building. He would scour the budgets of the federal administration as well as the congressional record to discover programs that could be channels for securing funds for Georgetown projects. Beginning in 1961, he also began writing bills that friendly congressmen and senators introduced and shepherded through the two houses to become "earmarked" legislation for Georgetown. His initial authorship was PL 90-457, a bill that provided $80 million in grants and long-term, low-interest loans to construct medical and dental facilities at Georgetown. Senator Morse waited for three and a half hours during a particular session until there were only three Senators on the floor, all of whom he knew to be friendly to the Georgetown legislation which he then introduced and passed in less than five minutes. The second major bill that Father Collins wrote, PL 9 1-650, the Medical- Dental Manpower Bill of the District of Columbia, proved even more crucial for Georgetown. The medical and dental schools of the District were unique in the country in not having any government subsidies that state governments ordinarily supplied to such institutions. The bill, as crafted by Father Collins, called for the federal government to provide up to $5,000 for each medical student in the District of Columbia and up to $3,000 for each dental student. The totals were carefully calculated to cover the mounting deficits that Georgetown had been experiencing in its Medical Center. When the bill finally became law in 1971, President Henle celebrated it as "truly miraculous" funding that was a life-saver for the Medical Center. It more truly reflected the meticulous planning and coordinated, persistent lobbying that would make Father Collins legendary in the halls and staff rooms of Congress and the federal bureaucracy over the next three decades. Father Collins and his staff built up a remarkable network of friendly Congressional members and staffers, many of the latter graduates of Georgetown or other Jesuit institutions, to ensure the successful passage of legislation from conception to appropriations. One of the congressional allies, the late Edward P. Boland, the Massachusetts congressman who chaired an Appropriations subcommittee, once described Father Collins as "probably the best floor-walker who comes to the Hill."

Georgetown became a pioneer among institutions of higher education in securing legislation specifically shaped to meet its needs, often through experimental programs designed to be national exemplars. Critics deplored the "earmarking" tactics that were used for securing money, but grudgingly admired Georgetown’s "magical ability" to secure federal dollars for campus projects. One such demonstration project was an energy plant, built in 1976, that utilized a fluidized bed combustion system that burned without pollution high sulfur coal. Designed to be a model for the energy systems of universities and hospitals nationwide, its design was eventually adopted by more than two score institutions around the country. Another model built by a large federal grant and loan was the Intercultural Center (opened in 1982), a complex of offices, classrooms, auditorium, computer and language laboratories with a solar-paneled roof to supply energy. Other projects included the development of a fuel-cell powered fleet of buses, and the conversion of chilled water to energy. Over the years such projects and other initiatives of the Office of Federal Relations resulted in the securing of hundreds of millions of dollars in federal support for the institution. In effect, from the 1970s into the 1990s, the office became the major fund raiser for the university.

Announcements from the Maryland Province are published as needed.
This notice is archived on the web: www.mdsj.org/Deaths/Collins_TByron_2.htm
If you have any questions or concerns, please contact William Watters, SJ, 410.532.1412.