Sulzer Library Officials 'Thrilled' With $5 Million Makeover

With leaky windows and a strained budget, Ward 47 Ald. Ameya Pawar turned to public financing to improve Sulzer Regional Library.

About $5 million worth of interior and exterior projects will give the 28-year-old library a facelift.

Improvements include a new roof, bathrooms, landscaping, and window replacement, Pawar said.

More details on the repairs will be released after the design process, with construction starting and ending in 2014. The library won’t see many—if any—service disruptions, according to Chicago Public Library spokesperson Ruth Lednicer.

“We’re thrilled about the improvements and look forward to it,” she said. “The chance to do something like this is huge.”

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Sulzer serves a much broader audience as a regional library, Lednicer said. With only two out of 76 libraries designated as regional status, the branch hosts larger events and provides more services.

“It will really help the whole city,” Pawar said. “This library is an institution in the community, not just in our ward, but the entire North Side.”

To fund the project, the alderman turned to tax increment finance money provided by property owners in the Western Avenue TIF district.

“These are long-deferred capital improvements,” Pawar said. “During the campaign, we talked about using TIF money for public projects and I think locally, that’s what TIF reform looks like.”

The library has seen minor upgrades since its construction in 1985. Two years ago, a federal grant paid for 100 computers on the second floor.

Pawar said his office would schedule a community meeting to present plans and gain feedback on the upgrades.