Replacement of the Central Library has been an issue for the last 15 years. To say that this is new is incorrect. This is something folks have been asking for for a long time. If the cricism is that the plan has not been fully developed, the question is how much money would you like to have spent on a plan that may not receive funding or may receive a different level of funding? What the City and Library put out was a responsible plan without doing full design, which would have cost millions of dollars. Dollars that the Library doesn't have. If the critisism is over the addition of the branch libraries as a "pork barrel", the branch libraries need upgrading because they were not built to accomodate computers. None of them. The world of information has changed over the last ten years and none of the library facilities was built to take that into account. I would invite anyone to go to our libraries this weekend and try to find an empty computer. Also the number of books has grown. That's what happens with a book collection. Those books have to go somewhere. Right now, they throw books when they don't have room. Regardless of the outcome of the election today, these issues need to be addressed. Carol Becker Longfellow ----- Original Message ----- From: D.Klein <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: Multiple recipients of list <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Monday, November 06, 2000 8:16 AM Subject: Library vote > I am usually a lurker on this site, mostly because I feel I don't have a > good grasp of the issues discussed here (but obviously I am interested!) - > and since I was soundly walloped for my one voiced opinion on graffiti. > But, I offer my (and others of my family and acquaintance) opinion on the > library vote as perhaps the voice of those of us who don't "get" the debate. > > We're not voting for it. (We are voting for schools.) > > I may be wrong, but the site, method, means and manner of obtaining a new > main library seem seriously flawed, and the corollary branch plans seem to > be a weak addendum. I am no longer willing to vote for something with the > good faith that it will all be worked out later in the details. Give me > good details and I'll support it. > > This has nothing to do with our property taxes. We pay alot, and are > willing to do so in order to live in this city in a great neighborhood. In > fact, for a terrific library plan, I'd pay more. But closing the central > library down for years, building it in the same location, and shuffling > books and people around in the interim makes no sense to me. Why not > consider a city/county merger? My hometown did it twenty years ago. Why > not move to the Sheraton Hotel site, make it part of the skyway system, make > it a city center rather than an out of the way afterthought? Why bundle the > branch plans in with the catastrophically needed central building? > > If all of these questions, and more, have been cogently answered, well then, > I haven't gotten it, and neither have those I have discussed it with. > > When I moved here twenty years ago I was excited, anticipating using a big > city library. Had to be much better, I thought, than what I was used to > living in smaller and less progressive towns. While I moved to St. Paul > (what did I know?), I worked in downtown Minneapolis. But, even though my > office was one block from the downtown library, I found I used on a weekly > basis, a beautiful old St. Paul Carnegie library on Marshall Ave. I > preferred that and the downtown St. Paul library to Minneapolis. Why? > Because when I first saw the downtown Minneapolis library, I laughed. I > thought it was a joke. I couldn't believe that a city of this size and > sophistication, to say nothing of striving for a world class, arts-forward, > progressive reputation, could consider that mess, that pole building with > escalators, a world class public library. Everywhere I had lived had > better, and many towns were smaller, less noted and poorer. Then when I > finally moved to Minneapolis, I thought - now I bet I'll have a great old > Carnegie building to take the kids to for story time - and what's our > neighborhood library? The Walker - a groovy basement space with tin can > signage - out of necessity to explain what the heck it is (LIBRARY, thank > you very much), overlooking a littered, unused courtyard. So where do we > go? Ridgedale. But we shouldn't have to. > > The rationales given for a new central library are so "well-reasoned", so > "well-studied" and so lame! For example, one of the core reasons given is > that there might be a fire and it isn't well protected! People! The > average voter isn't going to rally around that concept (not to ignore the > Fahrenheit 451 implications). Please! Give us something with heart! How > about "The building is baboon-faced ugly, it never worked, it never could > work, we messed up. Could we just start over and do it again?" That I'd > vote for. > > So - bring me a simple, well thought out plan that doesn't look like pork > barrel with 293 amendments tacked on and I'll support it, I'll vote for it, > I'll campaign for it, and I'll help pay for it. But this one isn't it. > > > > > Also in support of the mandatory use of Spellcheck, (all grammatical and > punctuation errors are my own). > > D. Klein > Kenwood > >
