Pine Bluff ponders options for old library

Committee gathers ideas for new building or renovation of 1960s structure

PINE BLUFF -- Library officials in Pine Bluff know they need a new facility or a major renovation to the old one, but details on what exactly will be done remain unsettled.

A committee made up of library board members charged with forming a plan will meet Wednesday to further discuss the issue, as it has done over the past several months.

Built in the 1960s at the Pine Bluff Civic Center Complex, which also houses City Hall and the headquarters for the fire and police departments, the library "has served the community well for many years, but it's time for something new," said Michael Sawyer, director of the Pine Bluff Jefferson County Library.

City Hall and the fire and police departments are undergoing major renovations.

Whether the library will be renovated or relocated hasn't been decided.

Sawyer said money is the biggest obstacle, adding that a millage increase likely would be needed before anything could be done.

Pine Bluff residents now pay 1.6 mills of property tax to the library, according to the Jefferson County assessor's office. Outside the city, it's 1.4 mills.

The last millage increase for the library was in 1996, Sawyer said.

The Pine Bluff Library was established in 1913 with help from the Pine Bluff chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution.

In 1979, an agreement between the city and Jefferson County created the Pine Bluff/Jefferson County Library System.

The system operates branches in Altheimer, Redfield, Watson Chapel and White Hall.

Sawyer said he and the library's committee members have been talking with other library directors around the state to form ideas about what they want to see in a new facility.

He said the plan is to "dream big, and cut it down if we need to."

About two hours south of Pine Bluff in Camden, a new library is just months away from opening.

A 2011 fire caused by a faulty paper shredder destroyed the city's old library, charring a majority of the books and heavily damaging records and other artifacts from the city's past.

Since the fire, a makeshift library has been set up at the Garden Oaks Shopping Center on Cash Road, just a few blocks away from where the new library is going up.

Insurance money is paying for the cost of the $1.9 million, 8,800-square-foot building, which is double the size of the old library.

Camden Library Director Lisa Pickett said construction should be completed by the end of the year, and the library should be open in early 2015.

Pickett said it will likely take several years to build the collection back up to the 50,000 or so books the library had before the fire.

Around Ouachita County, anticipation is building about the new library.

Rita Leffel said she has been making plans to take her granddaughters to the library when it opens next year.

She said they have been "anxious and excited" about the new children's area.

"You know, we have been without a permanent library for so long, and this is just going to be like one big Christmas for us when our new one opens," Leffel said. "It's a pretty great thing."

In Pine Bluff, many library patrons say they, too, hope to have a new building one day.

Trinka Flowers, who held her 4-year-old son's hand outside the library Friday afternoon, said a new library could spark children's interest in reading.

"It just feels old, and it's depressing in there," she said.

"I know when I go to a new place and see the bright lights and new things, it really gets me motivated. This could be just the thing Pine Bluff needs to spark some new economic development."

State Desk on 09/15/2014

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