The fate of $1 billion in proposed building projects across Minnesota could pivot on one question that state lawmakers are having a hard time getting answered: How much will it cost to expand the state's controversial sex offender facility at Moose Lake?

Gov. Tim Pawlenty first wanted $96 million for the project. This year, he scaled it back to $89 million. In a hearing two weeks ago, the program's director said he needed at least $61 million. Four years ago, state officials estimated that the expansion would cost only $47.5 million.

"It's just always a moving target," said House Speaker Margaret Anderson Kelliher.

The friction and shifting price tag over the facility are emerging as the major sticking point that is likely to force another showdown with Pawlenty, who already threatened to veto an earlier version of the massive building projects bill.

On Tuesday night legislators, complaining that they still lack precise numbers, moved to include $47.5 million for the project -- brushing aside a last-minute Republican attempt to have the figure increased to $60.5 million.

With another key House vote looming Thursday, state officials have yet to make public a cost breakdown for the project, leaving some legislators to complain that they lack information on details as simple as how much will be spent on a new, large kitchen for the program's patients.

Program officials have not responded to a Star Tribune request for the cost breakdown and Dennis Benson, the sex offender program's executive director, sidestepped questions about the project again Tuesday. He also has not responded to requests for a formal interview to discuss the project.

The continuing dispute over the sex offender program's expansion comes five months after the department was forced to backpedal after it was widely criticized for providing big-screen TVs for patients at a time of steep budget deficits.

The skirmish also comes at a time when more legislators have begun to fundamentally question the state's sex offender program, which uses civil commitments to keep sex offenders locked up after they have served their prison time.

No patient has ever been released from the program, even as projections show that the number of patients is expected to double in seven years. Minnesota, critics say, is uncomfortably at the forefront of states that use civil commitments to detain sex offenders.

Building opened 8 months ago

Only last July, state officials opened another $45 million building to house the growing program.

Pawlenty has insisted that $89 million be included in a state bonding bill for the latest expansion and two weeks ago threatened to veto a $1 billion bill that he said was too large and that omitted the expansion funding.

While he has not publicly released cost details for the project, Benson has said in public testimony that delaying the newest expansion would expose Minnesota to more problems. "We're in a spot here ... not only [due to] growth but [with] the constitutionality" of the program, he said. "The courts are watching this program very, very closely.

"We are double bunking [sex offenders]," Benson said of the housing arrangements at Moose Lake. "Not too many states do that. I don't know that any others do. We're pushing the envelope ... [but] that brings costs down."

Republicans, meanwhile, accused DFLers of micromanaging the project.

"They're getting into the business of approving or disapproving floor plans," said House Minority Leader Kurt Zellers.

'Numbers have all changed'

He said too many DFLers were raising cost concerns based on "their historical remembrances" of earlier financial projections, which he said are no longer relevant. "The numbers have all changed," Zellers said, adding that the governor's $89 million figure was the new working number.

But at a hearing on Feb. 21, Benson was asked for a bottom-line cost estimate. "The infrastructure is $61 million. That is an absolute in my mind -- a must-have," he said.

Benson said his office, at Pawlenty's request, had reduced the project's overall cost from $96 million to $89 million by eliminating "a few thousand feet off of the design."

"That's about as good as we can do," he said.

Benson's office has released data -- but not line-item costs -- showing that the $60.5 million would include money for, among other things, a laundry, treatment rooms, a warehouse, loading dock, canteen, a kitchen and dining area, and space for religious services.

Another $28.5 million would pay for space for 400 beds. "Do we need all 400 beds the day that it opens?" No, Benson told a legislative panel last month.

A day after Benson's testimony, Sen. Keith Langseth, DFL-Glyndon, an influential legislator on the bonding bill debate, said he was mystified. "Why should it cost $61 million for a kitchen and some rooms?" he asked.

As legislators Tuesday debated how much money to give the project, some DFLers said they still were frustrated by the lack of details.

Rep. Alice Hausman, DFL-St. Paul, the lead House DFLer on the bonding bill, circulated a 2006 memo showing that the project was scheduled to be built in 2008 at a cost of $47.5 million.

"I've been trying my best to find out what kind of a [building area] footprint $47 million represents," said Rep. Loren Solberg, DFL-Grand Rapids, who chairs the House Ways and Means Committee. "I've not been able to do that. I have met with everybody and their uncle, including the [state] commissioner of finance."

Mike Kaszuba • 651-222-1673