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Main branch of Schenectady library to close for 18 months
Wednesday, April 30, 2008
By Kathleen Moore (Contact)
Gazette Reporter


SCHENECTADY — The main branch of the Schenectady County library system will be closed for 18 months during an expansion project, a library trustee said.

John Karl said no one knew that the library would be closed until clerk of the works Anthony Ward took a look at the plans two weeks ago.

“He said this design would not be practical to achieve without closing the library for 18 months,” Karl said. “When he saw the plans, he said, ‘We can’t keep it open.’”

County Legislator Karen Johnson confirmed the library will have to be closed, although she declined to say how long the closure would last. That won’t be announced until the county has come up with a solution, she said.

“None of us saw this coming,” she added, “but we should have. We’re talking about HVAC, electricity. ... There will be times the building will be without electricity.”

Karl said the project simply cannot go forward with such a long closure.

“Closing the library for that period of time would be unacceptable,” he said.

But he and others seem to have reconciled themselves to the fact and are looking for ways to minimize the effects of the closure.

“The branches are not suitable to absorb much at all of our programs and services,” Karl said.

So the Friends of the Library and library staff met Tuesday night to discuss temporary library sites downtown.

“We were offered the top floor of the Carl Company building from Proctors,” Karl said.

He added that the county estimates it would cost $500,000 to make that space usable, particularly with Internet access, which is one of the library’s most popular services.

Karl said the group also discussed using the Annie Schaffer Senior Center, which has been closed for four years and might need substantial work.

“We’re trying to keep the services downtown,” he said. “A majority of the people who access our library are people who live in and around the area. Many of them come on foot. That’s a big concern — we have 1,400 people a day, what are you going to do with them?”

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“We were offered the top floor of the Carl Company building from Proctors,” Karl said.

He added that the county estimates it would cost $500,000 to make that space usable, particularly with Internet access, which is one of the library’s most popular services.

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SCHENECTADY
Library to shut during project Trustees: Closure will make expansion quicker, cheaper
BY KATHLEEN MOORE Gazette Reporter

    The main branch of the Schenectady County library system will be closed for 18 months during the expansion project, library trustees said Wednesday.
    In a vote April 24, the trustees agreed to shut down the bustling library because the project could be done more quickly and would cost much less with the building closed. The building could be closed as early as June, although some county legislators have discussed delaying the entire project because of its cost.
    The project would take a year longer if the library were kept open, Board of Trustees President Esther Swanker said. It would also cost an additional $1 million to $1.5 million on top of the original $7.7 million budget, she said.
“It would be much more expensive and much more time-consuming,” she said. The trustees also decided it would be too expensive to move some library resources to a temporary location that could be used by library patrons during the project. One option was to spend $500,000 turning the top floor of the Carl Company Building into a library. “That’s not a wise expenditure,” Swanker said. “We have nine branches. This is an excellent chance to put them to very good use.” But not all the trustees are happy with the decisions. Trustee John Karl said the project simply cannot go forward with such a long closure. “Closing the library for that period of time would be unacceptable,” he said. Karl said no one knew that the library would be closed until the clerk of the works, Anthony Ward, took a look at the plans two weeks ago. “He said this design would not be practical to achieve without closing the library for 18 months,” Karl said. “When he saw the plans, he said, ‘We can’t keep it open.’ ” The news came as a shock to trustees and county legislators. “None of us saw this coming,” County Legislator Karen Johnson said. “But we should have. We’re talking about HVAC, electricity … there will be times the building will be without electricity.” Legislator Vincent DiCerbo added that although he had no idea the project would require such a long closure, the work must be done. “HVAC, electricity — that absolutely has to be done. For 30 years the county skimped on maintenance,” he said. “If the library has to be closed, I don’t see we have any other choice.”
    Staffers will be able to get into the building during construction, so Swanker envisions an interlibrary loan system that would allow residents to request main branch books and receive them days later at one of the other branches. The same system could work for the main branch’s large collection of audio books, videos and DVDs. Staffers are designing the operations plan now, Swanker said.
    But Karl and others aren’t ready to give up yet.
    “The branches are not suitable to absorb much at all of our programs and services,” Karl said.
    So the Friends of the Library and library staff met Tuesday night to discuss temporary library sites downtown. County Legislator Gary Hughes, chairman of the Committee on Libraries and Education, said he’s hoping sites could provide Internet access and meeting space for the many programs the library offers each week.
    The semiannual Friends of the Library book sale may be moved to City Hall, he said. Among the other sites discussed were the Carl Company Building, which could be used at much less cost if it isn’t turned into a full-fledged library, and the Annie Schaffer Senior Center, which has been closed for four years and might need substantial work.
    Karl said “We’re trying to keep the services downtown. A majority of the people who access our library are people who live in and around the areas. Many of them come on foot. That’s a big concern — we have 1,400 people a day. What are you going to do with them?”
    Hughes later said that 10 percent of the patrons at the main branch come from the 12305 ZIP code, the immediate area of the library, while 90 percent come from areas also served by branches. The majority drive when visiting the main branch.
    Hughes wants to find downtown sites for the library’s popular lunchtime, evening and weekend programs, but emphasized that he doesn’t support opening the library during the construction.
    “I can’t emphasize strongly enough that it’s for the safety of the patrons,” he said. “This will be an active construction site. The asbestos, turning the power on and off … it really would not be a safe location.”
    The project went out to bid this week, Karl said. County officials had previously announced that construction could begin as early as June if the project gets reasonable bids.
    The price tag is expected to be $7.7 million, but the county faces a budget shortfall of at least $5 million in 2009. Legislators are seeking ways to reduce costs and increase revenues without resorting to tax increases; some have discussed delaying the start of several major construction projects, such as the library expansion, as a way to reduce costs next year. There is also talk about closing library branches and reducing nonmandated services.
    The county Legislature would provide $5.7 million toward the project, paid through bonds. The library board and Friends of the Library have raised about $2 million in private donations since the project was announced four years ago.

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EDITORIALS
Library plan: back to the drawing board

    It’s almost impossible to believe that until a few weeks ago, no one involved with the Schenectady County Library expansion project — which has been in the works for years — had the slightest inkling it would require shutting the library down for 18 months during construction. Yet that apparently is the case, and the library’s board of trustees has already agreed to the plan and is soliciting construction bids. It is such a bad idea that trustees should instead scale it back, or the county Legislature should reconsider its sizable financial commitment.
    This page has supported the ambitious expansion plan all along: The library is good enough and popular enough (attracting 1,400 visitors per day) that it merits the considerable cost of a firstclass renovation. But not if the renovation means closing for such an extended period of time.
    While the library system maintains nine satellite branches, there is no way they could come close to picking up the slack. The branches simply don’t have the books and other materials, or the room for the library’s voluminous number of programs. And while it would be possible to shuttle some of the materials back and forth from the main to the branches during a shutdown, it would be such a cumbersome and inconvenient process that a good number of library patrons would probably just say “the heck with it.” Eighteen months is a long time!
    Given the high cost of the plan — $7.7 million, of which $5.7 million would be furnished by the county — combined with the county’s current economic difficulties and the soaring cost of construction materials, it would probably make more sense to scale back. Yes, the building’s heating and air-conditioning systems need to be replaced, but does the library really need a new theater when the McChesney Room it would replace is almost as large? (Leaving the McChesney intact would also preserve the library’s nicest architectural feature.) Couldn’t the children’s section be built off the east side of the building (as originally proposed), toward the police station? That would give it more space and cause less disruption. As for the coffee bar, it may not be inappropriate, but it sure seems like a nonessential luxury.
    Because of its financial situation, the county Legislature had recently been thinking about delaying the project a year. That seems like an excellent idea now, because it would give everyone time to modify the proposal, eliminating the frills and the need for a lengthy closure.

Quoted from bumblethru

Well, if the library can be closed for 18 months, than perhaps it isn't needed at all.

Quoted from MobileTerminal

I think we should put more computers into schools, that's where education is centered.  

I also think rather than putting 7.x million into a library makeover, spend that 7 million to put a computer into every students home - you'd only spend half as much.

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VIEWPOINT
18-month library shutdown a major disservice
BY PHIL SHEEHAN For The Sunday Gazette

    An open letter to the trustees of the Schenectady County Public Library:
    With all due respect, ladies and gentleman, have you lost your minds? You want to shut down the main branch of the library for a year and a half, and with only one month’s notice?
    Stop and think a moment, something you apparently failed to do earlier, when the current problems might have been avoided, or minimized. We are not talking about a drugstore or a gas station, whose regular customers need travel only an extra block or two for aspirin and oil. We are talking about the public library, the hub of cultural life — and for many people, social life — in the center of the city.
    You report that traffic (a mean, impersonal term for “people who want to read books or listen to music”) at the main branch is 1,400 a day. Can we afford to turn away that many people, people who are, and I’m choosing my words carefully, people who are the lifeblood of the city?
DON’T WORRY? NO, WORRY
    You may not like the metaphor, but it’s an apt one. What happens to the body when you diminish the flow of blood for a year and a half?
    Your answer, according to the article in Thursday’s Gazette, is “Don’t worry. Only 10 percent of those 1,400 come from the 12305 ZIP code.” The implication is that only 140 people a day will be shut out of the library.
    To which I reply, in the euphemism of my sainted mother, who almost always used the barnyard phrase itself, “Bushwah.”
    First of all, it’s a mistake bordering on criminality to summarily dismiss even 140 people a day. In addition to people stopping to borrow a book, that 140 will include young children learning to appreciate books and music and storytelling; it will include school-age children being tutored in difficult subjects or being helped to finish complex projects; it will include seniors who come to read the papers or to meet with friends. These are all vital functions of a center-city library.
    But 140 is a bogus statistic. Unless you have someone checking each patron’s home address — a thing that has never happened in the hundred or more times I’ve been in the main branch — you cannot know where all your visitors come from. So either you count the cards that are used that day, or you count the total number of cards you’ve issued.
    If it’s the cards used that day, you are ignoring everyone who does not use a card, or does not have a card. Those are likely to be people who live nearby, who can stop in every day, who don’t need to take materials out. Or those who — living nearby — use the library as a social center more than a cultural center.
CULTURAL MAGNET
    And please, please, do not underestimate the library’s value as a social center. It will speak very badly of you.
    If the statistic is based on the dis- tribution of all cards, it ignores two more important points:
    Those who live nearby are the ones most likely to visit the main branch.
    Those who come from farther away, who did not go to their nearby branch of the library, did so because there was something in the main branch they could not get at the local branch.
    In short, all of the 1,400 who come in on any given day are there because they want something they cannot get elsewhere. So stop with the “10 percent” bushwah.
    A final point to answer other objections: Even if every one of those 1,400 people came to the library from another county, think what that would mean. It’s 1,400 people who are visiting, using, appreciating Schenectady’s center city every day.
    You ought to be doing everything in your power to keep those 1,400, and more, coming into the city daily.
    And as long as I’m wound up, here’s another charge for you to answer.
    Neither the trustees nor, apparently, anyone else, knew until two weeks ago that this project — in the works for how long? — would require that the library be closed.
    What does it say about the wisdom, foresight and overall competence of the board that no one bothered until now to investigate that aspect of the project? To set this whole thing in motion, and never once bother to find out how much it would interfere with normal operation of the library suggests — in the most generous interpretation I can devise — that you are spectacularly naive.
    So, what basis is there for us to trust your judgment about the best way to continue this project? The president of the board says the library must be closed for 18 months. Otherwise, it will take a year longer and cost a million dollars more.
    Really? In your already-established naivete, you perhaps do not understand the numbers in a public works project. The $7.7 million cost, and the 18-month deadline, are fi gments of a combined imagination. They represent a compromise between what the planners assume it ought to cost, and what the trustees think the taxpayers will tolerate.
    One more factor: These are numbers that have yet to be reconciled with the reality of contractors’ bids, or the even more brutal reality of final bills.
DELAYS, HIGHER COST
LIKELY
    Allow me a prediction, one which I will be overjoyed to see proven wrong. The project will not be completed in 18 months, and the cost will exceed $7.7 million. The overage on both numbers will be at least 25 percent.
    Look again at one of the alternatives you considered: Spend half a million dollars to convert nearby empty space into a temporary library.
    “Not a wise expenditure,” says the board president.
    Wrong. It looks very good right now, and will look downright brilliant two years from now, when the expansion project still is not complete.
    And finally, it is disingenuous at best to use arbitrary numbers — rather than concern for the public good — to decide to close the library. As I said before, this is not a gas station or a drug store.
    It’s a center of learning, a cultural beacon, a gathering spot for a wide variety of valuable and even necessary activities. It’s a magnet for the center city area.
    You close it at our peril.

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Plan to close main Schenectady library for 18 months is folly

    The Schenectady County Legislature is now seeking bids for a major renovation and expansion of the central library. This is a major step that will impact a large segment of the city’s population and, as the project is presently structured, the near-term impact will be decidedly negative.
    Without seeking public input, and ignoring the wishes of the Friends of the Library, the Legislature is planning to close down the entire Clinton Street facility for the duration of the 18-month construction project. To those of us familiar with the planning and execution of engineering projects, this is a bizarre idea. One does not close down a vital community service for such a prolonged period just for the convenience of the construction contractor. It should be a precondition of the contract that the facility be kept open and operating with a minimum of disruption while the renovations and expansion are completed.
    Of course, there will be temporary interruptions and “work-arounds” — that is normal in any such project. But if a competent architect and a responsible contractor are chosen, these interruptions should be days or weeks in duration — not months. To propose otherwise is simply irresponsible. One has to wonder what “hidden agenda” the county Legislature is pursuing in this matter.
    Serious efforts to expand and modernize the downtown library began more than three years ago. An architectural concept that addressed the library’s needs was presented by the library trustees to the Legislature two years ago. After rejecting this plan, the legislators funded the preparation of a much more expensive plan that involves tearing down the much-used McChesney Room and relocating the library entrance. Granted that the county has responsibility for the library, it appears that they have been more concerned with exercising their authority than they have been with continuing and improving the library’s services. They seem to think that the branch libraries (there are nine) can “pick up the slack” for an 18-month period. Anyone who takes a serious look at the problem will conclude that this is not feasible. The branches are too small, too little parking and are not convenient to the downtown area where the central library draws many of its regular patrons.
    Space does not allow me to give a detailed accounting of the programs that are carried out every day at the Schenectady County Public Library. Suffice it to say, an average of 1,400 people use the Clinton Street facility every day, and more than 1 million loan items are circulated every year. The programs administered by the library staff and Friends of the Library serve people of all ages and income classes. Needless to say, those in the lowest income brackets will suffer most from the loss of free services that are now available to them at the library.
    I believe our library system is one of the bright spots in Schenectady County. I hope that the citizens of Schenectady will raise their voices to protect the central heart of this system — and I hope our county legislators will realize the folly of suspending operations at the Clinton Street facility for any prolonged period.
    EUGENE A. ROWLAND
    Niskayuna
The writer is a member of Friends of Schenectady County Public Library.

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Quoted from MobileTerminal:
... I also think rather than putting 7.x million into a library makeover, spend that 7 million to put a computer into every students home - you'd only spend half as much.

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Quoted from yarbdoc:
... Can you curl up with a good "computer" on a rainy afternoon?

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Putting Y in Center City as absurd as closing library for 18 months

    Two front-page stories in the May 1 issue concerned me deeply: Schenectady County’s main library would close in June or July for at least 18 months, to allow for needed refurbishing and expansion of the facility, and the Capital District YMCA is itching to relocate the Schenectady YMCA to City Center, across from Proctors in the heart of downtown.
    The library project was launched three years ago, but amazingly, at this late date, the bidding process has not been concluded. Schenectadians remain in the dark as to which firm or firms will undertake the library project. With that question unanswered, it cannot be credibly said that the timetable for completion of the library project is settled. Nor can it be credibly claimed, by any public authority in Schenectady County or any other interest, that no accommodations can be made to ensure that different parts of the main library are worked on by the contractor(s) in ways that will allow it to continue delivering myriad services to a deeply appreciative community.
    The branch libraries are ill equipped to substitute for the main library in this regard, whether or not the county, facing budget stringencies in 2009, seeks to cope with that problem by, among things, closing library branches and reducing nonmandated services.
    The gems of public cultural and intellectual life in Schenectady County are the main library and the community college. The community at large would suffer grievously if either of them ceased functioning for any considerable time.
    From the article, it appears that the primary interests with regard to relocating the Schenectady YMCA to the City Center site are those of the Capital District YMCA, as represented by its president and CEO, J. David Brown, and the Galesi Group, which owns City Center. The article makes no reference to key questions of public policy that ought to weigh in the balance: Is it good public policy to site a large YMCA, which serves diverse program needs, among others, in the strategic middle of a downtown area whose revival is keyed to a mix of cultural, entertainment and smallscale commercial development?
    Might the public interest be better served by relocating the Schenectady Y somewhere along Erie Boulevard, to upgrade and vitalize that major artery? Or to some area of the city away from downtown, to give impetus, at last, to neighborhood development?
    ALVIN MAGID
    Niskayuna

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SCHENECTADY
Library plan draws fire Support group says ‘public against’ closure
BY MICHAEL LAMENDOLA Gazette Reporter

    The Friends of the Schenectady County Public Library are a little less friendly these days toward the Democratic-controlled county Legislature.
    The library support group has launched an effort to prevent the county from closing the central branch of the library for the next 10-12 months as part of a $7.7 million overhaul. Earlier estimates placed the shutdown at 18 months.
    Several members of the volunteer group, which raises money for and provides free help to the library system, attended a presentation on the proposal at Monday night’s committee meeting of the Schenectady County Legislature. They were not allowed to speak; the privilege of the floor is reserved for the regular monthly meeting, to be held May 13.
    However, Friends President Bernard Allanson said after the presentation he has serious concerns about the closure, scheduled to begin this summer. The Friends are concerned about the public’s loss of programming and access to free Internet, the closure’s effect on downtown businesses and the way the Legislature pushed the project through without any public discussion.
    One volunteer at Monday night’s meeting said leadership in the county Legislature forced library trustees to accept the latest design, otherwise the county would not pay for the work.
    Eugene A. Rowland, a 30-year member of the Friends, said he believes the Legislature ignored the needs of the library and the public. “About 1,400 people use it each day and it has some services not available at other branches. To me, this is very poor planning. They are saying the easy way is to shut it down and that is how they will do it.”
    Friends’ member Fred Thompson said the group distributed 1,000 surveys to people attending its book sale Saturday at the central library. People returned 725, and 710 of the respondents said they did not want to see the library closed. Based on this response, “the public is against the closure,” Thompson said.
    Friends’ member Eleanor Rowland said four years ago the Friends and library trustees came up with a proposal to build an addition between the library and the police station. The project was less expensive and would not have resulted in the closure, she said.
    Eugene Rowland called the design a no-frills plan that did not change the present entrance of the branch and did not eliminate the McChesney Room, which serves as a public meeting room. “It was a simple design. It was functional and it would have done what we wanted to do for four to five million dollars,” he said.
    He said library trustees took the plan about two years ago to the Democrat-controlled county Legislature, but the Legislature decided to start over. It hired a new architectural firm at a cost of $455,000 for what was then supposed to be a $4.9-million project. The project was to construct an addition.
    The project grew to its present cost when a review determined that the building’s operating systems needed to be replaced, that handicapped-accessible bathrooms had to be installed and that the library grounds required extensive landscaping.
    The project underwent extensive redesigns over the next two years, the most radical occurring in 2007. That was when a committee consisting of county Legislature Chairwoman Susan Savage, D-Niskayuna, Legislator Vincent DiCerbo, DSchenectady, and County Manager Kathleen Rooney balked at the building’s exterior design and at plans to add a second entrance from the rear parking lot.
    “They came up with a plan that replaces the present entrance, eliminates the McChesney Room and adds a coffee shop that no one thinks we need,” Rowland said.
    Engberg Anderson Design Partnership of Milwaukee prepared the final design. It calls for the addition of 9,000 square feet to the first floor. While this is less than the originally proposed 15,000-square-foot expansion, the new design contains double the space for the children’s room, a small cafe, a performance center and a private reading room. It also retains the building’s architectural look through the use of brick and precast and poured concrete.
    The design will remove the protruding semicircular McChesney Room from the library’s Clinton Street side and make the entire wall flush. Library officials will rename another area the McChesney Room.
    Preservationist group Schenectady Heritage Foundation opposes the demolition of the McChesney Room. It says the library’s current configuration is historically significant architecture that should be preserved.
    Eleanor Rowland said the design change pushed up the cost. “No one wanted the new entrance, not the Friends, not the trustees,” she said.
    The closure could become an election issue if Republicans have anything to do about it. Minority Leader Robert Farley, R-Niskayuna, called the project a “case of poor planning.” He said the county “cannot close this library. I will tell you, ladies and gentlemen, your constituents will have your heads.”
    The potential political fallout of closing the central library could force Democrats to postpone the project for a year or longer, said one Democrat legislator, who did not want to be identified.
    Project manager Tony Ward said the county learned in March it would have to close the library to complete the project on time and within budget. “There isn’t an inch of this site not affected by the construction,” he said.
    The interior will be gutted and new heating, lighting, plumbing and air conditioning systems installed. The county will also have to install sprinklers, which were not required 40 years ago, to bring the building up to code. He said public safety would be jeopardized by the level of work, making even limited access impossible.
    “There would be no place to sit and the most it could accommodate was 100 people a day,” Ward said.
    Library Director Andy Kulmatiski is developing contingency plans to increase programs and services at the system’s nine branches and other sites downtown should the library close this summer.
    The current cost of the project is $3.5 million for the addition and $1.6 million for repairs to the library’s aged, mostly original electrical, plumbing, heating, ventilation and air conditioning systems. The architects factored in $339,000 for site work, $843,413 for new furnishings, a 10 percent inflation cost of $561,504 and $849,406 for professional fees and testing. The final price tag is $404,221 less than the initial design proposed two years ago.
    The county Legislature will provide $5.7 million toward the project, paid through bonds. The library board and Friends of the Library have raised about $2 million in private donations.

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Speak out against plan to close Sch’dy library

    I’m sure this will be one of many letters protesting the imminent closure of the central library in Schenectady [May 1 Gazette].
    As a trustee of the library board and a member of the Friends of the Library board, I urge the county to rethink their decision to close the library for reconstruction for up to 18 months. The branches, while numerous, cannot absorb the services and programs provided at the downtown facility. None of the branches has adequate parking. The city branches have no room for programs and the Hamilton Hill branch is not handicap-accessible, not to mention that it is cockroach-infested. The upstairs and basement of Scotia have been declared unsafe.
    Our clientele needs the access to computers and the Internet, and to tutors who can help with GED and ESL training in a convenient location. Our legislative leaders should ask the librarians and clerks, who work with the people daily, what is essential. Schenectady can’t close for 18 months, or any similar period, the most cost-effective and efficient service in the whole county.
    I would also urge the public to take back control of this vital service and tell your legislators that they have been grossly mistaken in their underestimation of the people’s attachment to this wonderful gem of a library we have in Schenectady. The question that should be asked is why the county government took over this project and shut off important and constructive input in its development.
    JOHN KARL
    Niskayuna

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SCHENECTADY
Library plan draws fire Support group says ‘public against’ closure
BY MICHAEL LAMENDOLA Gazette Reporter

    
    One volunteer at Monday night’s meeting said leadership in the county Legislature forced library trustees to accept the latest design, otherwise the county would not pay for the work.

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The more you think about it, the worse library plan is

    I saw the May 4 Viewpoint column, “18-month library shutdown a major disservice,” by Phil Sheehan, and I am even more dismayed than I was the other day when I first learned that the library is to be closed for 18 months.
    And then we are told that there is “no problem” in spreading around the downtown programs to the branches — ha! Then I learned that not only do we lose that lovely entrance walkway colonnade along the present children’s room and McChesney Room, we “gain” a café and a drive-through window. Most emphatically, a café is not needed. Our public library is just that — it’s definitely not supposed to be a Borders or Barnes & Noble. It doesn’t need a drivethrough window; this is a public library — it’s not supposed to be a McDonald’s — duh!
    The original plan (so many years ago) called for a modest expansion to the east. As I recall, that plan would expand the children’s program area the computer area and upgrade the utilities. This has turned into a nightmare. I guarantee it will take longer than 18 months, and there will be significant cost overrun. This is just what happens on public projects, and the pres ent economy is pushing up the price of ev erything. Schenectady County’s tax dollars are paying for this (the biggest chunk of it anyway) so I can only hope there will be significant outcry against this boondoggle Is there no one brave enough to scream “no way!”? Is there no one on the county board willing to listen?
    Am I the only one screaming in the wilderness? I don’t think so. Not only was there the piece in the May 4 Opinion sec tion, there was a letter to the editor from [Friends of the Schenectady County Public Library member] Eugene Rowland, “Plan to close main Schenectady library for months is folly”; there was the May 2 Ga zette editorial, “Library plan: back to the drawing board”; and that wonderful car toon accompanying the editorial.
    RUTH E. BERGERON
    Schenectady

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Closing downtown library seems counterproductive

As a longtime resident of Schenectady County, I have often reconciled my high taxes with the benefits of our main branch library.
In the center of town, around the corner from Jay Street, it’s a great place to hang out on a bad weather day, meet a friend, take a grandchild or browse for just the right book, music or movie.
Eighteen months with no downtown library. Wasn’t the point of Metroplex to get people back into the heart of the city?
NANCY ORTNER
Scotia