The Manhasset Library Board of Trustees are exploring ways to better utilize the library space and serve users during a period of changing technology.
“The building is 10 years old and the space has to be responsive to the residents it serves,” Library Director Maggie Gough said last Thursday.
Gough said the way libraries were utilized by residents when the Manhasset library was built has changed and that the library has to respond to the needs of its residents.
“We are moving from print to e-copies,” Gough said. “People are asking for additional study space, a space where they can play games and where to set up computers.”
To help assess its options, Gough said, the trustees have enlisted the help of Roger Smith, who was the architect who designed the library.
Smith met with the trustees in November and suggested possible changes such as moving book stacks to different floors and reducing the number of books kept by the library.
He also suggested the board consider changes in how existing rooms are used, the addition of a conference/study room and the addition of different furniture for a different feel.
The board then asked Smith to provide building floor plans, a survey and a 3D model
Trustee Joanne Kesten said Smith’s work would cost the library about $10,000
At the board’s Feb. 15 meeting, Smith said the kinds of changes being considered by the library board would cost between $650,000 and $1.2 million, Kesten said.
Gough said the meeting with Smith was only an effort by the board to asses its options.
Kesten said before moving ahead the board should consider the financial impact on the library.
“How would the library pay for it,” Kesten asked. “We need to consider the proposal with some conscience and fiscal responsibility.”
At the March 30 board meeting, Kesten and Trustee Donald O’Brien engaged in a back-and-forth about how much of the board’s conversation with Smith should be included in the board’s February minutes.
Kesten said she wanted the minutes to be as detailed as possible so that residents have an idea of the scope of discussion about the project.
“I mean, how much are we talking about,” O’Brien asked. “How much is going to be included in the minutes.”
Kesten said she had emailed the board in late February, calling for the minutes to reflect the nature of the board’s conversation with Smith.
“You can go ahead and vote on the minutes but I’m not going to,” Kesten said.
O’Brien later said he didn’t have an issue with the minutes or the details.
“It’s too early to estimate the amount that it would cost and the minutes don’t reflect the accuracy of what we talked about,” O’Brien said.
Kesten said she was concerned with the costs of the project.
“We’re living in a time of tax cap and we’re still paying off the bonds,” Kesten said. “What does the community see as necessary that is beneficial to the community.”
Kesten said she presented the idea of some sort of community involvement to get constituents behind the idea.
“A lot of people perceive the library to be brand new,” she said. “I don’t know that we’ve looked at this enough because we have a fiduciary responsibility to our residents. I’m concerned about the perception of the spending of the money.”
Kesten said she wants the board to go about the project in the right way and ensure it coincides with the library’s mission.
“We don’t want residents to think we all just sat here and said nothing to Smith, when in fact we challenged him and asked him all these questions,” Kesten said during the March 30 board meeting. “Just because he designed the building doesn’t make him the de facto person to do this renovation.”
She said she also wants the request for proposal schematics that Smith creates to be owned by the library in case the project was awarded to someone else.
“I will approve the work if it doesn’t tie us to Roger Smith,” Kesten said.
She also said she wants the board to consider how “re-purposing” space meshes with the library’s mission and the constituents it serves.
“If the driving force of the library is free space, then we’re nothing more than a YMCA,” she said
Efforts to reach trustees William McLean and Robert Carrozzo as well as Smith were unavailing.
