City (Pensacola) Considers Building New Downtown Library

August 19, 2008
Pensacola News Journal
Jamie Page - jepage@pnj.com

The Pensacola City Council is considering spending $6 million on a new downtown library.

Library officials requested money for a new library during its budget presentation at the city's budget workshop Monday for the 2008-09 fiscal year, which begins Oct. 1.

The Pensacola Public Library on West Gregory Street was built in 1956 and was expanded in the 1960s. Gene Fischer, West Florida Public Library director, said Monday the library needs major updates.

"It's just falling apart. It wasn't designed as a modern library," Fischer said. "It was built back when public libraries were essentially warehouses for books. Now people want computers and meeting spaces, and it just wasn't designed for that."

The West Florida Public Library board of directors recently voted unanimously in favor of building a new downtown library.

The five council members present for the presentation backed the request to move forward in hiring an architect next fiscal year to design a new library and agreed to weigh options for building it. Options include tearing down the existing building and constructing a new one in its place, refurbishing it, or tearing down the old city fire station on Spring Street and building it there to keep the existing library open.

The design would be done next year, with construction coming later, said Dick Barker, city finance director.

The city has $6 million in local sales tax money set aside for a library project. That money would build an estimated 20,000 to 30,000 square feet of space. The existing building is 27,500 square feet.