Dewey Decimal must be spinning in his grave.
Last week, it became increasingly clear that the project to build a grand new downtown library in Madison was fading away faster than the newspaper industry, and plans for a public-private partnership with Fiore-Irgens were called off by last Thursday. The time stamp on Mayor Dave Cieslewicz’s blog post put the time of death at 7:08 p.m.
The Fiore project seemed like Mayor Dave’s dream date. She was glamorous, sexy and expensive. As proposed, the process would have involved the Fiore building a new library at Washington and Henry Street. Upon completion of construction, the old library would be relocated and the property sold to Fiore for further development into condos or, more likely, a hotel. All told, taxpayers would have had to foot about $16 to $17 million of the $37 million price tag to the city, with the rest coming from the sale of the old library property, tax credits, borrowing and — most glaringly — an expected $10 million in private contributions.
Date option number two was decidedly a lot plainer: gut the library, remodel it and reopen it. And right now it looks like Mayor Dave is going to have to settle on his second choice for the prom.
Luckily, she’s still pretty cute. And besides, even if the mayor doesn’t know it yet, that first girl isn’t right for him to begin with. Besides the expensive taste, and the fact that I’m pretty sure she’s a Cubs fan, there are two big reasons why the Fiore proposal never quite made sense.
The first one is simple enough: money. The original plan called for construction to begin with a $10 million gap in funding and the assumption that private fundraising could cover the difference. Needless to say, the current economic climate makes any capital campaign more than a little risky, and betting that much on the success of a telephone drive seems to be bad politics in the short term and bad policy in the long term. Even Cieslewicz is beginning to see the light, saying, “We will need to count on less private fundraising in a tight environment for philanthropy.”
Moreover, there are cheaper options out there. Although the city determined they got more bang for their buck with the Fiore proposal, they made that call when measuring against a $27 million remodeling proposal. The city council saw several other plans, ranging from about $15 to $20 million to renovate, repair and refurbish the current building. So while we’re tightening our belt, it may only make sense to swallow some pride as well and select a more practical, affordable option.
Second, the role of libraries in society are changing. Despite the inability of the city and the developer to come to terms on an exact price, the fact remains that libraries are becoming less and less important as information centers, and moving toward functioning more as general public space. In that vein, a six-story stone and glass structure would be nice, but decidedly superfluous. Since the facility won’t serve as a hub for tomes of information or house school children poring over books for science reports, a more modest design is in order.
Buying a couple extra floors because we think we can or because it seems like a good deal isn’t worth it if they won’t be used or can’t be furnished. This is a lesson my dad learned the hard way during his first trip to Sam’s Club — you won’t finish that gallon of mayonnaise before it spoils. Whatever form the new library takes, the design should be modest and take care to fit the evolving role of the modern library.
So while Mayor Dave may be disappointed he isn’t taking the cheerleader to prom, he can take comfort in knowing that she wasn’t right for him anyway. Plus, she seemed kind of stuck-up.
Joe Labuz ([email protected]) is a senior majoring in biomedical engineering.
