Library Renovation Projects Progressing

The will soon have a modern, energy-efficient revolving door, and if all goes as planned, a newly designed circulation desk that library officials expect to make working at the library more easier and more efficient and visiting the library a more pleasant and convenient experience.

The front door construction project has been underway for several weeks, and Fort Lee Library Board of Trustees president Paige Soltano said they are “making headway.” Although Soltano wasn’t able to provide exact timing on when the door project would be completed, she estimated six to eight more weeks, meaning it should be finished by the end of February or early March.

She said the door project needed to get done in order to save money.

“It’s going to be much more efficient with the air conditioning and the heating; it’s not going to be a wind tunnel,” Soltano said. “When the doors would fly open, it would just be a gust of air, so now that it’s circular, and it’ll move much slower, it’ll save energy. Papers won’t go flying around, and it should be certainly more aesthetically pleasing to boot.”

Soltano added that such problems with the front doors have “always been an issue.”

“It was certainly an early design, but we’ve had a lot of problems with them,” she said. “So I think in that regard we’re definitely trying to move in the right direction.”

During construction the public is advised that entry to the library is restricted
to the entrance from the parking lot via the Children’s Room, and that patrons can enter from Main Street by walking to the rear of the building. Signs are posted to direct
pedestrian traffic. Also during construction, disabled access is available from the
parking lot.

Meanwhile, the library’s circulation desk project is slated to go out to bid in February, according to Soltano, who said that the project is intended to make the circulation area more functional and efficient for both library employees and patrons. She said the current design is neither comfortable nor convenient for the people who work there, and that the redesign is more of a curved area that should prove much more “accessible” for library employees.

“The way it’s set up now, it’s a long counter, and then there’s a little space in the back that’s like an office for the person who runs the circulation desk that’s not particularly efficient,” Soltano explained. “And then behind that actually are bathrooms, and the odors are front and center and can be incredibly offensive for a lot of reasons.”

Soltano said the architectural firm library officials are working with, Ronald Schmidt and Associates, has drawn up plans to make the circulation area “much more inviting” and “much more functional,” and to include a glass wall partition to gain some separation and a book drop at the front of the desk—something the library hasn’t had up in the past.

“I think a lot of people just dump the books on the counter,” Soltano said. “What [the architects] are suggesting is to have a book drop right at the desk, and then glass that separates the back of the circulation desk from the bathrooms behind it.”

She said that in the process of planning the circulation desk project, engineers discovered a small HVAC system dating back to the 1971 construction of the current library that “has been around much longer than its life should have been.”

She said the challenge for architects then became what do about the outdated HVAC system while maintaining the overall aesthetic design they proposed.

“So part of it is because the thing is so old that we’re able to replace it before it actually breaks and we’re really in a bind,” Soltano said. “They suspect it’s been around 20 years past its prime. Hopefully now it’s just another few more months that we really need it to be around.”

The public library moved to its current location in 1971, and there has been only one addition since that construction—the back building off the rear parking lot that Soltano described as having been “just tacked on.”

“Although in theory, I think it’s great, in practicality, it really just doesn’t work as well as it should,” Soltano said of the building. “When the library was re-planned back in the 70s, nobody knew that having hot spots was going to be key, and how the media was going to change and everything else, and I think we’re a little behind. But we’re really working toward making it much more functional and technologically advanced while being fiscally responsible.”

Fort Lee Councilman and Library Board of Trustees Mayor's Representative and Treasurer Joseph Cervieri said the library has about $670,000 in reserve, which he noted is “more than enough” to accomplish the two projects.

“And at that point, we’re going to see how much more money we have left, and then tackle the next piece of it,” Cervieri said, adding that the front door and circulation desk are just the first two of about six or seven improvement projects library officials have identified in a process that has been ongoing for about three years.

“So we’re doing a little bit at a time,” he said.

Cervieri called the renovations and improvement projects “exciting,” but also said the board is “constrained by the funds that are available.”

“The one good thing that we knew was that we were well on our way to having those funds in reserve earmarked as we were going through this process,” he said. “The governor’s office said that library’s that had excess funds have to kick that back to the state. But we already have it earmarked, so those funds are spoken for.”

The library board next meets on Wednesday, Jan. 18 for its annual reorganization meeting. Soltano said she doesn’t expect any major changes on the board.