A big-ticket item at the Peterborough Town Meeting this year is an $8.5 million restoration and reconstruction library project.
Peterborough Town Library Director Corinne Chronopoulos said the project is a public-private partnership with some funds for the project to be raised privately and the remainder to come from taxation.
A volunteer-driven capital campaign took on the task of raising $5.5 million in private funds for the project. So far, it has raised about $4,080,000. Chronopoulos said the group is waiting on additional announcements that could push the needle closer toward its overall goal.
The project leaders are also seeking $3 million in taxpayer funding.
Barbara Miller, a Peterborough select board member, said tentative numbers regarding how the project will impact tax rates have been estimated. A 30-year bond for the library project could impact taxes by about .26 cents per $1,000 of valuation. For a property valued at $200,000 that would be about $52 per year. A 15-year bond for the project would impact taxes by about .41 cents per $1,000 of valuation, or about $82 per year for a property valued at $200,000. Residents pay taxes twice a year.
Miller said the town is in the process of a property assessment, which completed in full every five years, that could change the value of properties, and therefore, the tax rate. She said town could also end its fiscal year with a surplus, which could be directed at reducing the tax rate.
The Peterborough Town Library is touted as the oldest publicly funded library in the nation. At Town Meeting in 1833, Peterborough residents voted to purchase books for a public library, which were made available in the general store, according to a page on the library’s website. The collection was later moved to its current location in 1893. The town added two additions to the building in 1957 and 1978.
The new design plan — which was created by Ann Beha Architects, a company based out of Boston — calls for the 1892 segment of the building to be restored and integrated into a new segment of the facility. The 1957 and 1978 additions are proposed to be demolished and replaced with a new wing that will shift the facility’s focus to Concord Street and the Contoocook River. The library’s current footprint is about 16,000 square feet, and although the proposed project is about 17,000 square feet, Chronopoulos said it will feel bigger. That’s because the current space only has about 10,000 square feet of usable space.
A page on the library’s website about the project says because of the current building’s “substandard conditions” that the library has become “defined more by its limitations than its possibilities.”
Chronopoulos listed three main reasons the library needs to be upgraded, which included handicap accessibility, energy and efficiency, and technology infrastructure. She said the current building can be difficult for people with disabilities to navigate due to its layout and said she has talked to people who have told her they no longer can get in-and-out of the space because of accessibility issues. She said the current building’s heating and cooling process is “inefficient” and “costs the town a lot of money,” a problem that would be addressed if the project goes through. She said the technology infrastructure is currently not where it needs to be either. She said the library would like to have technically equipped classrooms available for the public, along with more outlets, and a strong wifi connection, among other things, to bring it up to 21st Century standards.
Miller said the board is concerned about raising taxes for people who are already having difficulty making those payments and for people who are on fixed incomes.
“The way I position this is that a significant amount of what the library does is free. So for those people who are struggling, there’s a lot of free services that the library offers that they would otherwise have to pay for,” Miller said.
Miller said personally she recently took two courses on cloud storage that was offered through the library for free. She said if she had hired someone or taken a seminar somewhere else that it likely would have cost $85 to $150.
“Just by taking this program I got more than what I’ll have to pay in additional taxes,” she said.
But Bernie Woods, who has lived in Peterborough for about 30 years, said he is against the project.
“I think personally it’s a waste of money,” Woods said. “I think a lot more things have to be done in Peterborough than building an addition to the library.”
He said the town’s roads have potholes that should be fixed before money is poured into projects like the revamping the library. Woods said he’s also concerned Peterborough’s taxes are so high that young people can’t afford to move into town.
“You ever wonder why young people don’t live here?” Woods said. “Because they can’t afford to.”
Woods, who is in his 80s, said he’s able to absorb tax increases, but said he feels like the town is disregarding the young people.
“We need things in this town to attract young people and we don’t do that and I don’t think a library is going to do that,” Woods said.
Voters will decide whether or not to fund the library project at Town Meeting on Wednesday, May 9 at 6 p.m.
Abby Kessler can be reached at 924-7172, ext. 234 or akessler@ledgertranscript.com.