Library Remodel Hits Roadblock
By Nick Mason, The Bradenton Herald, Fla., The Bradenton Herald, Fla.
Jan. 4–MANATEE — Plans for major remodeling of the Manatee County Central Library in downtown Bradenton are dead for now.
State library officials declined to extend a $500,000 grant that expired Dec. 23.
The grant expired three days after Manatee County commissioners declined to award a $1.9 million contract for the central library project.
“We don’t have the funding to do it,” Diane Frenz, the county’s information services director, said Tuesday.
County Administrator Ernie Padgett and Frenz said they intend this year to salvage two minor parts of the project — installing new carpet and repainting.
But plans for a new north entry lobby with stairs and an elevator, removing existing interior stairs to create more space for library programs, and adding a canopy at the south entrance, have been dropped.
“We cannot save the project as it is,” Padgett said. “The best we can do at this point is the carpeting and the painting.”
County officials intend to apply by April for a new state grant for library construction, but the earliest a new grant would become available is July 2007.
“We will definitely re-apply,” Padgett said. “At that time, maybe it will be feasible to come up with our part of the money and complete the project.”
Rising construction prices through 2005 hit the library system hard in scarce bidding by contractors during October for construction contracts reviewed by county commissioners in December.
In September, the county’s engineering consultant, Wade Trim Inc. of Tampa, estimated the Palmetto library expansion and renovation would cost $1.92 million. In October, the only bid submitted was $2.45 million by DeLesline Construction Inc. of Palmetto.
Commissioners and their staff tapped library reserves and gifts to the library system to help pay for the $2.45 million contract award for the Palmetto library. That project also received a $500,000 state grant.
A year ago, county financial managers estimated it would cost $1 million to expand and renovate the central library, 1301 Barcarrota Blvd. The expansion segment was deleted from the project before bids were sought last fall.
Pat Cook Construction Inc. bid $1.9 million for central library renovations, but commissioners declined to accept it Dec. 20. They directed Padgett and the library staff to ask for a six-month extension of the state grant to give commissioners time to explore their options.
Marian Deeney, library program administrator in the Florida Department of State, wrote to Padgett that there was no authority to extend the grant.
“Unfortunately, the public library construction grant program rules do not provide an option for the Department of State to extend the date for awarding a contract,” Deeney wrote. “An extension may be granted only when litigation is pending.”
Deeney explained that the county’s “only option” was to apply for a new $500,000 grant that might be financed by the state Legislature in 2007.
Nick Mason, county government reporter, can be reached at 745-7081 or at nmason@HeraldToday.com [mailto:nmason@HeraldToday.com].
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