Library expansion may be overdue

Library volunteers hope a $20,000 donation to country will be a catalyst for improvements.

By Pam Eubanks
| 6:00 a.m. May 18, 2016

Assistant Branch Supervisor Judy Mullen, Friends of the Braden River Library President Martha Crabb, library Branch Supervisor Cathy Laird and Friends' Vice President Judy Harris show off the symbolic check.

East County
News

If Martha Crabb and her fellow Friends of the Braden River Library have their way, a $20,000 donation to Manatee County will translate into more books, more meeting space and more opportunity for the library and its patrons.

The group on May 10 donated that amount to the county so it can secure architectural and engineering designs for an expansion of the existing Braden River Branch Library.

Now, they wait.

“Our original plan was to keep what we had to furnish the library once it expanded, buy shelving and furniture,” Crabb said. “But we thought if we did this, it might be a way to show the county we’re very serious about needing this. We need more parking and would love a garden. All the ideas we have are somewhat contingent on having the library expanded. It’s to show the county commissioners what we’re after.”

The branch offers more than 400 programs annually, and it’s closed two days a week. It services nearly 170,000 people and checks out more than 275,600 items annually, as well.

Library Branch Supervisor Cathy Laird said the library’s biggest need is more meeting space.

Will Lakewood Ranch get a library?

In less than a year, Cheri Coryea, director of Manatee County’s Neighborhood Services Department, hopes to start community discussions on a potential library site in the Lakewood Ranch area.

She said a new East County library location was an unfunded, needed project in the county’s capital improvement plan in 2015. Funding likely will be available in about five years.

She expects Manatee County will start collecting data from residents in January/February 2017 to determine the future library’s makeup — whether geared more toward children or adults, or whether it may have more hard copy books or more digital offerings.

Lakewood Ranch community development district supervisors have discussed purchasing the former Summerfield Information Center, at 6310 Lakewood Ranch Blvd., for community uses, and Town Hall Executive Director Anne Ross and Coryea have discussed the location as a potential library site. Coryea said the building is much too small for a library — most are 25,000 square feet or larger compared with Summerfield’s 2,700 square feet of usable space — but Manatee could provide a lending library or host programming.

“We have a big need for small glassed-in study areas,” she said. “We have one, and we could easily use four or five of those.”

Other wish-list items include a computer lab, a designated room for children’s programming, an outside garden and more.

Cheri Coryea, the county’s neighborhood services director, said the expansion was placed on the county’s five-year capital improvement project plan about three years ago as a “project of record,” meaning there was a need for it but no funding available. In the next budget cycle, she’ll be asking for money.

The county’s new impact fee schedule, adopted in April, allocates money specifically for libraries and is a new funding source.

“It may not be enough to build the entire project, but it’ll be enough to do something,” Coryea said, noting the county might be able to do fundraisers and find grants to supplement the effort. She hopes the project can be completed in two to five years.

Coryea expects representatives of the Friends group, county staff, library staff and the architect to begin meeting in June and to continue meeting through the summer. She said architects likely will deliver a plan for the expansion sometime in December. At that time, the county will have cost estimates and can better determine whether the library should be expanded at once or in phases.