Santa Monica Library Board Rejects Proposal for New Building

Santa Monica’s Library Board has rejected plans for a new main library, recommending instead that the city remodel and expand the existing facility and replace its asbestos-based ceiling.

Richard Horst, chairman of the five-member board, said the recommendation reflected the sentiments that residents voiced in public hearings. City Manager John Jalili originally called for a study of new sites and possible changes.

“The library has been at or near the existing location for more than 80 years,” Horst said. “Santa Monica residents told us that they continued to favor the present site because of its central location and easy accessibility.”

City Manager John Jalili, who last fall began looking for a new library site, said that his office will study the board’s recommendation before making a recommendation to the City Council for final approval sometime in April.

The library, at 1343 6th St., is the Westside’s largest, housing 225,000 volumes and circulating 700,000 books a year.

The city has been debating what to do with the facility since November, 1983, when a firm hired to clean up book stacks and other areas of the facility stirred up asbestos fibers that had fallen from the ceiling.

Asbestos was commonly used when the library was built in 1964 because it is fire resistant and because it lengthens the life of plaster when mixed with it.

Subsequent testing showed that the building had safe levels of asbestos, but the library’s 57 full-time employees remained afraid that they might contract asbestosis, an often deadly lung disease associated with inhaling excessive amounts of the fibers.

Horst said that it would cost about $7 million to remove and replace the ceiling, remodel the facility and add another 30,000 square feet to the 47,000-square-foot building.

He said that the city has budgeted $2 million to replace the ceiling. Horst said he would support a bond issue to finance the rest of the project, expected to take three years.

“Recent city surveys have shown the city’s library system to be the most popular city service,” Horst said. “I would support a bond issue to give us a first-rate public library and I believe it would pass easily.”