>
>A new downtown library has the potential to benefit all the residents of
>the metro area.
People outside of Minneapolis have either the Hennepin County, Ramsey
County, or St Paul libraries. Those folks do not help with the costs.
>
>John Ferman said, among other things:
>> So I say no free lunch downtown, too and will vote No on the library
>referendum. Let the downtown interests pay
>for their new library. The downtown library is hard to get to, there is
>no parking to speak of, so it can't be said to be of much benefit to the
>people in the neighborhoods.
>>END QUOTE
>
>Not only is this not true, it is incredibly shortsighted. It is not
>THEIR new library, it is our library. Right now, books from the Downtown
>Library circulate to every part of Minneapolis and beyond. The Downtown
>Library is a great and easy treat for our family when we drive or ride
>the bus there. We have never had a probelm parking in the lot right
>outside the Hennepin Avenue entrance. It provides us --people in the
>neighborhoods-- with one the greatest benefits of all, books.
I just recently tried to use the downtown library, because they would not
send certain of their books to a branch library for examination. This is
service. I took the bus (round trip fare was $3.00) and looked at their
full postage-stamp sized parking lot and also noted the meter rate.
My statements about property tax reductions for businesses is very true -
in fact the Strib a while back noted that fact as one of the reasons
dwelling property taxes are skyrocketing. Let business pay their fair
share of any library improvements or do without like so many neighborhood
needs have.
What no one has proposed is two new libraries: one small
business/commercial branch downtown and one major repository outside of
downtown, like east of Chicago but west of Cedar.
Jack Ferman
Minneapolis, MN
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
