CROWN HEIGHTS — Residents concerned with a plan to move a Crown Heights library to the Brooklyn Children’s Museum brought tough questions to library and museum officials Tuesday night — including whether or not adults would be fully welcome there.
The plan would close the Brower Park Library at its current St. Marks Avenue location and move it inside the museum, a block and a half away. When it was first announced, the Brooklyn Public Library said the $3 million project would create a space catering to families and children.
That worried Myrtle Stowers, a retired teacher from Crown Heights who said she uses the current library “constantly” and is concerned the new space would someday restrict access to families only, like at the museum, which does not allow adults unaccompanied by a child to visit.
“I’m just concerned about the fact that once it moves … at first we could go in, then they put on different stipulations and rules that you can’t go in unless you have a child with you,” she said, echoing concerns brought up by several community members about adult services and access at the new library.
In answer, library officials were unequivocal: the new library will be “open to everybody,” said David Woloch, VP of External Affairs for Brooklyn Public Library, including adults.
“It doesn’t matter if you’re a small person or a tall person, an old person, a young person. Our doors are open to everybody and they are free,” he told attendees.
Currently, the BPL runs special programming for young people, including at its Youth Wing at the library's Central Branch, located about two miles from the Crown Heights branch.
Residents attended a public meeting on Tuesday night regarding the library plan hosted by the Brooklyn Community Board 8 education committee. (Photo credit: DNAinfo/Rachel Holliday Smith)
Community members got answers to several issues about the library plan — which is not yet funded and therefore not set in stone, Woloch said — including issues of the size, cost and staffing at the new location. Here are the highlights:
► Why move the library?
The BPL says it needs to move the library because of a large and expensive list of capital needs at the St. Marks Avenue location, including a roof, boiler and HVAC system that need replacing. In total, repairs would cost about $5.6 million, officials said. The building is not city-owned (it is leased from a private landowner) and therefore unlikely to be funded for renovations, according to Brett Robinson, VP of Finance and Administration at BPL; very few repair projects at leased branch locations are funded, he said. If the library system wanted to buy the property outright, it would likely cost above $3 million, Woloch said.
► How much will the new library cost?
The BPL estimates the new library will cost $3 million to build within existing administrative space in the Brooklyn Children’s Museum. The library will pay rent to the museum, which will be “comparable” to its current rent on St. Marks Avenue, which is $180,000 annually and $60,000 in real estate taxes, according to Robinson.
The budget of BPL comes from a mixture of taxpayer funding and private donations.
► How big will the new library be?
The new Brower Park Library will be about 6,300 square feet, which is almost exactly the size of the current library, the smallest in the borough’s library system, Woloch said.
► Will librarians keep their jobs?
Officials at Tuesday’s meeting said no staff at the current Brower Park Library will lose their jobs, though not all of them will be guaranteed positions at the new location; all staff will be guaranteed work within the BPL system.
Stephanie Wilchfort, director of the Brooklyn Children’s Museum, said it was important to her and the rest of the museum staff “to hear that the library staff would be well treated, well taken care of and that, most importantly, no one would lose their job in this,” she said.
► What’s the next step for the plan?
To move forward, the project needs to secure capital funding from the city in this year’s budget, which is slated to be approved before June 30, Woloch said. If the funding comes through, the new library will be ready to open by early 2019, the BPL says. If it does not, the BPL will consider other options for the St. Marks Avenue building, where the current lease ends in summer of 2020, Woloch and Robinson said.
