All options are on the table – including moving out – with library’s nearly 30-year old main branch needing an $18.3 million renovation.

By Bob Seidenberg

Evanston Public Library trustees indicated Wednesday they may press for a new agreement with the city, reacting to a preliminary report that placed costs for renovation of the main branch at $18.3 million.

The figure was included in a study by Moody Nolan, a design firm that has been working with the library since February to evaluate the current condition of the building at 1703 Orrington Ave. and assess its space and program needs based on current and future use.

EPL Executive Director Yolande Wilburn – who presided over a building program that included the opening of five library branches in her former job as director of the Santa Cruz, California library system – sounded undaunted by the figure.

She noted that the renovation would present an opportunity to modernize the building’s infrastructure, including its roof, “to get us to where we need to operate for another 30 years.”

Several trustees on the library board, though, were worried. The library, which has an annual budget a fraction of the size of the city’s – $10 million compared with $400 million – would have to dip into its reserves and finance a bond to pay for the project.

“It is shocking, I mean frankly shocking,” said board President Tracy Fulce. “And what it brings up to me is really needing to have a serious discussion about a building we do not own.”

Under the library’s current agreement with the City of Evanston, its facilities belong to the city, while the the library, though a separate taxing body, is responsible for upkeep.

Several years ago, city staff proposed moving city operations out of the Lorraine H. Morton Civic Center at 2100 Ridge Ave. and into the third floor of the library, arguing that the change could bring foot traffic to a downtown feeling the effects of COVID-19.

City officials are still in the process of trying to fit all operations into their “temporary” home at 909 Davis St. downtown, where they are supposed to relocate later this year from the Civic Center.

Fulce said library officials should be “super clear about getting some documentation around the building and around its value, and maybe even making this building our [the city’s] building. I would like to get my arms around this in a way that doesn’t feel like I’m going to spend $20 million, and then the city is going to come in and say, ‘Okay, by the way, now we want to move into the third floor and second floor.’”

She also reminded board members that when the library’s north branch was sold in 2020, the library’s separate taxing body didn’t receive any of the proceeds despite putting hundreds of thousands of dollars into its maintenance over the years.

“I want to ensure that our approach is one that we are being good stewards of this resource. And if we’re going to spend $20 million, are we going to be here?” she asked. “We haven’t even discussed our possible plans for different locations, so I feel like all those conversations need to be brought to the board.”

Directing her comments to trustees, Fulce continued, “I think one of the things I would like to hear from you at our next meeting [Sept. 18], even crazy options, like moving out.”

She noted there had been discussions in the past about moving into the Gibbs-Morrison Cultural Center at 1823 Church St., which currently receives little use from the city, and perhaps including an affordable housing component.

“What I would like to do as a board is not to think how previous boards probably looked at it, like, ‘Oh, well, we’ll just patch this problem.’ This is not a patch problem.”

Trustee Michelle Mills was among those who said that “there’s a lot of opportunities here,’’ expressing the need to examine whether the existing space fits the library’s goals, which include bringing service to underserved areas.

A “long term conversation is still underway for the library in that area, and this is an opportunity to merge those discussions in terms of meeting the needs of our community,” Mills said.

Building regarded ‘a textbook example of design’ when it opened

Evanston Public Library trustees approved a $98,000 contract with Moody Nolan in July to look at the Orrington Avenue building’s condition.

The Prairie-style, 112,000-square-foot building was hailed as a “textbook example of design” when it opened its doors in October 1994.

But officials have had to devote increasing resources to upkeep of the building in recent years, installing new boiler systems and energy efficient lighting as the facility’s infrastructure aged.

In a power outage at the library on Aug. 1 that knocked out service for the entire day, officials had to send a crew member to Maywood to find a replacement box for the blown transformer.

“I think it was wonderful they were able to locate that part,” Wilburn told trustees at their Aug. 21 meeting. “And if they had not been able to locate that part because it’s not manufactured anymore, we still might be closed.”

The building also lacks a backup generator, she confirmed.

“In just about every library that I’ve come out of,” Wilburn said, “we had a backup generator, because we are the space the community comes [to] when there is a disaster, when there is an emergency situation. We’re the place that people can come to.”

An engineering team from Moody Nolan has already been on site to look at the electrical systems, wiring, plumbing and more – “doing an assessment of where we are and what needs to be repaired,” Wilburn said in a follow-up interview Aug. 22. “We previously had a facility assessment, but it expired years ago. We still haven’t got all those things taken care of.”

Carpet 30 years old, need for more outlets

“We recognize that there are issues with the building,” said Wilburn, who was named executive director last October after a nearly year and a half national search.

“It’s definitely outdated. Our carpet here hasn’t been changed in 30 years, so carpets need to be replaced. And if we’re going to pull up carpets, then we have to move bookshelves, and I think we have to look holistically at what renovations need to happen in the building,” she said.

“We need more outlets. We know that we constantly have issues with patrons who want to plug in their devices, and those devices plugged in may cause people to trip or fall.”

A dedicated space for middle schoolers

Wilburn added that the children’s reading room is another area in need of attention.

“We want a safe place for our children and parents to be able to come and get those early literacy skills that they need. That’s what we do. But then also, we don’t really have a dedicated space for middle schoolers. And so having middle schoolers feel like this is a space they can belong in is really important,” she said. “Right now, when you walk into the children’s room, it’s really geared towards younger kids. There’s really not a setup area for kids that are older and who might be reading juvenile fiction as opposed to studying, writing a report for school.”

Some kind of adult maker space is also in demand, too. Early on in her career, Wilburn was instrumental in helping set one up in Chicago, where adults work with digital design and fabrication, experimenting with different technologies.

“We know that we have a number of community partners that we work with, and we want to be able to expand our community spaces,” she said. “Our Falcon Room [on the third floor] is lovely, but we believe we have some additional space behind that with some windows that we can open up and make it a more usable space for community partners.”