Great Neck library budget up for vote

Adam Lidgett

Residents in the Great Neck Library system will vote Tuesday to approve the library’s $9,647,200 budget for the 2015-16 fiscal year.

Voting will take place in the multipurpose room of E.M. Baker School, at 69 Baker Hill Road the west gym of Great Neck South High School, at 341 Lakeville Road.

The budget, which calls for a $36,700 increase in spending over last year, calls for no increase in the tax levy. The total levy is budgeted at $9,375,000.

The budget calls for $5,640,700 to be spent on employee salaries and benefits, $891,800 to be spent on library materials and programs and $350,900 on operations, which includes legal fees, postage and computer supplies.

Also included in the budget plan is a $315,000 reserve for construction, which will be used to handle payments for the Main Branch renovation project. The library will use the reserve to front construction costs, for which they will be reimbursed the following month from bond proceeds, Neil Zitofsky, Great Neck Library business manager, has said.

The Main Branch, located at 159 Bayview Ave., will be closed for a year during an extensive renovation of the building. The improvements will be funded by a $10.4 million bond approved by voters in 2013.

The $315,000 reserve for construction will come from a $1,115,000 operating surplus the library has as a result of the Main Branch being closed for renovations.

“That’s coming from the fact that Main is closed for a year so we have savings as a result of reduced utilities,” Zitofksy said. “We also have reduced staff for a year.”

An additional $110,000 from the surplus is set to pay for possible repairs at the library’s other branches — Lakeville, Parkville and Station ­— which have received increased traffic as a result of Main Branch being closed.

The budget also calls for $250,000 to be taken from the surplus to buy new computers at all four library branches, Zitofsky said.

Some $440,000 of the surplus will be spent on a new sprinkler system at Main Branch, he said.

Share this Article