After 15 long years of discussion, debate, input, presentation, visioning and dissection, the Great Neck community will finally have an opportunity to vote Tuesday, Oct 25, on a referendum allowing the Great Neck Library Board to seek up to $20.8 million in bonding to renovate and improve the Main Library building.
Though there are those who will reflexively say that “in these hard economic times” (all together now) “we cannot afford it,” the true response is we cannot afford not to.
The Main Library opened in 1970, our forebears’ legacy to us. It was built to last 40 years. It was built before the Americans with Disabilities Act, before current health and fire codes, before the energy crisis (now 40 years old) and $100/barrel oil, before modern techniques and materials to conserve energy. It was built in the day when a computer with less memory than today’s thumb drive filled a room, and there was no such thing as Internet, 3G or 4G, no cell phones. Man had just gone to the moon, but in the interim, we have launched and retired an entire fleet of space shuttles.
Like the dying space satellites that are falling back to earth, the library building is falling apart and falling down. Literally. Pieces of the facade have fallen off; the retaining wall is crumbling. We spend a fortune on wasted energy, which is a crime on so many levels. We spent $8,000 a month last summer to rent a chilling tower when the air-conditioning system broke down for the last time, without which, the library had to close. The elevator failed and should have been replaced but was repaired in anticipation of eventually having a new one in a new building. Our kids are marched to storytime in the community room downstairs, which is no less uncomfortable and uninviting for them than it is for those of us who come for lectures, talks, movies, concerts.
We have no place for young adults, no dedicated space for teen study groups, computer use or book collection access; the Audio/Visual room is jam-crammed and inadequate; we don’t have individual or small group study rooms like every other modern library.
In this age of people demanding live Web casts for public meetings (significant when you have a couple of dozen of people who attend library meetings claiming to speak for 43,000 Great Neck residents), our community room has no live broadcast capability for board meetings and events.
There are those who suggest all of this can simply be “renovated” and in an alternative-universe fashion blame “faulty maintenance” when the equipment is so old, there are no longer parts being manufactured.
You cannot patch your way out of the problems this building has, you cannot modularly replace wiring in one section one year and another section another year. You cannot piecemeal replace the air conditioning or heating system.
There are those who say that in an age of e-books, you don’t need book stacks. But even if you found space for a young adults room, you cannot change the configurations of this building, because of the way it was engineered: the book stacks on the main floor hold up the mezzanine which is practically useless. The rooms are fixed, and so their uses are pretty much fixed as well.
And if we merely “renovated,” we would actually wind up with less space, less function, less flexibility because we would actually have to adhere to all those newfangled codes, such as the ADA.
But even this less functional, less useful building which we would be stuck with for another 40 years at least, would not come cheap. To do the most basic “renovation” would cost $13.5 million – not exactly chump change – and would amount to a $50 tax increase.
But for $30 a year more, we could have a 21st century building, one that is flexible, that accommodates our needs now, in this age of e-books, and can adapt to whatever the future brings.
A new children’s area would be doubled in size; there would be a new teen area next to Levels, an enlarged and more accessible DVD and electronic media section; a new computer lab; an improved community room; small-group and quiet study rooms. We would have more space for a local history room. The entire building would be handicap accessible, and all the systems – heating, air conditioning, electric and lighting and elevator – would be new and energy efficient.
Dattner Architects has designed an exquisite interior that will infuse a joy of learning (you can see photos and the concept drawings and plans at www.greatnecklibrary.org/libinfo/libreno.php).
Gabe Chieco, who grew up in Great Neck, recalls his first visit to the Arrandale Library (now Great Neck House), built by Louise Eldridge (who he actually met). He was seven.
“I was immediately enthralled with the sense of adventure, and learned about borrowing books. It set me on a path of a lifetime of reading. I still visit the library at least once a week.”
He’s 81 now, and the chairman of the Great Neck Library Music Advisory Committee, where he has been a member since its inception in 1969, bringing live musicians and classical concerts for the enrichment of the community.
“I am astounded by what I hope is a minority which believes that the status quo for the library is acceptable,” he told me following the Library’s “Sportswriters” program held at Saddle Rock school. “Where is the vision that anticipates the needs of the community such as Great Neck for the 21st century?”
In the 21st century, libraries may be less of a warehouse but will always be storehouses of knowledge, the locus for our culture, the depot for transmission of ideas. At a time when we spend too much time alone, comfortable within the parameter of ideas in a “virtual world” of our making, our library has even greater importance as the place where we can come together, as a community, as a society, and share ideas, brainstorm ideas, debate ideas, exchange experiences, and expand our intellectual universe.
Michael Kimmelman, the New York Times architecture editor, said as much in commenting on Zuccotti Park, the Occupy Wall Street Protest, and “the power of place” in forging a democracy. He spoke about the “serendipitous exchanges of people meeting face-to-face to discuss, ideas,” more important today in the age of “virtual spaces” than ever.
That is what is envisioned in the new building.
It is important to recognize that the actual building is not being torn down. The exterior is being kept, and 8,645 square feet of new space is being added on the south and east sides, basically building over the existing cement footprint, and not encroaching an inch into the wetlands.
It will entail gutting the present building, but it will completely redo, reshape the interior to best reflect the needs that we know about in our time, and to be flexible enough to change with changing technology, mores, interests and demographics of our ever-changing community.
This is the most debated, discussed, public-inputted, visioned public project ever known, and for all these years – going back to 1995 when the mortgage on the present building was paid off and the then-library board contemplated improvements – we have heard year after year after year, “We can’t afford it.” “The economy is bad.” “Property taxes are rising.”
That is what we are hearing, mantra-like, today.
But the fact is, we can’t afford not to build at this time.
We will never see interest rates as low as now, labor costs as low as now, material costs as low as now.
But here’s another thing: since around 1995, where there would have been a line in the budget to pay for the Main Library, there has been none. Had they kept the line and put money in the rebuilding fund, we would be able to buy the building for cash. Except that wouldn’t really have been fair to a generation of taxpayers who would have been paying for something for which they received no benefit.
It is fitting that our generation be taxed for an improvement that we will be able to enjoy. But it is likely that we would not even see an increase in taxes for the new building for another two years, when hopefully, the economy will improve and continue to improve. The $80 will only be an increase the first year, and then will be a regular line-item, much as the mortgage for the Main was from 1970 to 1995. And just like a mortgage payment, the $80 will actually get cheaper and cheaper over time, and yet we will have the benefit of the new building. It is also entirely possible that the library will save as much as the new building will cost.
But a new library is an investment in our future, our quality of life, and our community.
The most vociferous opposition comes from the South Side, yet that part of our Great Neck community is just as loud in demanding its third expansion and improvement to Parkville since 1995.
Great Neck Library Trustee Marietta DiCamillo took offense at the notion that the library board might offer a sort of quid pro quo, but frankly, I have no compunction. How dare they.
Since 1995, we also improved and modernized Station Branch twice, and now a third time, with an improved, modernized and expanded Station Branch in a new rented location.
And since 1995, we improved and modernized Lakeville Branch.
But since 1970, except for refurbishment of the children’s room and some minor fix-ups, there has been no substantial renovations or improvements to the Main Library.
If people truly believe we cannot afford $30 a year more to have a 21st century library, then shut down the branches – at least Lakeville. Why should we pay rent for a small facility that serves a tiny sliver of the community, rather than invest in our own community institution?
No doubt that will get the Lakeville folks riled up. They value their library.
Well, the greater Great Neck community values our Main Library, and just as Parkville, Station and Lakeville want a place where the community can enjoy programs and collections, so do we. And we know what our library should be because we see examples of it in communities throughout Nassau (Port Washington, Manhasset, Elmont), throughout Long Island, throughout the country. We see what communities not nearly as affluent or as populated as Great Neck have done with their community library, like Largo, FLA.
The most ridiculous reason to oppose the measure comes from another small fraction who describe themselves as devotees of the Main Library, hysterical over the prospect of the building being closed during construction, between 18 and 24 months.
But the building would have to be closed even for the most basic renovation. Would you want your children in a building with construction dust – plaster, possibly asbestos? Would you want anyone to risk being injured? Of course the building has to be shut down. If you did not, not only would it be unsafe, but the construction would have to be done in such as way that it would take twice as long and cost twice as much.
The library has a plan to rent space and will continue to offer programming, but the reality is, we do have three other branches, including an expanded, spanking new facility at Station. Live with it.
The intention is also to minimize any layoffs – a process that is governed by the existing collective bargaining agreement (though I would propose offering the employees an opportunity to reduce all their hours slightly in order to rotate in all the current employees who want to continue working).
The opponents have resorted to spreading untruths in order to get their way: for example, Levels will not be shut for two years, but will be offered in other venues.
And instead of turning Udall’s Cove muddy, as the opponents falsely charge, the improvements to the building will benefit Udall’s Cove by finally controlling the drainage from the library site into the pond.
The three pillars of our community are schools, parks and libraries – that is what define the boundaries, that is what identifies us as being Great Neck. And the quality of our schools, parks and libraries also the chief reasons that people choose to live here and why our home values remain high.
Communities, though, are more than institutions. They are shaped by individuals who collectively create a culture – a culture of neighborhood, a culture that supports learning.
At this time, I want to pay homage and express sadness at the passing of Elayne Bernstein, who served on the library board from 1978 to 2002, including as president. She supported our community in so many ways, not just promoting education and culture but in advocating for social justice.
Our library was founded by Louise Eldridge, who built the first library, and our library has been nurtured by a few community-minded individuals like Elayne Bernstein.
It seems there are fewer individuals, today, who stand up in that way, and that is how it should be. We should not and no longer can depend on maternal, paternal or corporate beneficence. It behooves us as a community to take on the responsibility, the mantle, and follow her example. Pass the referendum.
On Tuesday Oct. 25, 7 a.m. to 10 p.m., we will have the once-in-a-generation opportunity to vote on a referendum authorizing the library to borrow up to $20.8 million (which at 4 percent interest will total $28 million after 20 years). The concept drawings and plans for the improved building is at www.greatnecklibrary.org/libinfo/libreno.php.
You can get an absentee ballot from the District Clerk’s Office at Phipps Administration Building (since the vote is organized by the School District), 345 Lakeville Road, Great Neck, NY 11020.
Residents living south of the Long Island Railroad tracks vote at Great Neck South High School (341 Lakeville Road). Residents living north of the LIRR vote at the E.M. Baker Elementary School, 69 Baker Hill road.
