Overcrowded Library Is Getting New Lease on Life

On one wall of the San Fernando Public Library hangs a cartoon drawn by one of the building’s patrons. It depicts the library as bursting at the seams, books flying out the doors and windows.

The caricature is only a slight exaggeration, according to some workers and patrons of the tiny, well-used library on Macneil Street.

With only 2,700 square feet to work with, the staff has become adept at finding room for books and equipment where none seems to exist. The staff constantly weeds out the 45,000-book collection to find room for new books.

“If there are two people here at the same time, it’s a traffic jam,” Edythe Grant, a senior library assistant, said as she waited her turn to walk through the narrow area near the circulation desk and reference area.

Patrons have to go next door to the courthouse to use the public restrooms there because the library has none; the one restroom is for employees. The children’s programs often are held outside or in a chamber at City Hall across the street.

Building Leased

But all that will change in June when the Los Angeles County-operated library moves to a new and bigger home. After years of searching to find ways to relieve the overcrowding, the county has leased a building, now being renovated, a few blocks away.

The San Fernando branch, built in 1953, is one of the smallest in the county’s 91-library system and is also one of the busiest, according to county librarian Linda Crismond. It is ranked 30th in circulation, lending 163,889 books a year.

Crismond said the county and city for years have struggled to work out a financial partnership that would include foundation grants, community redevelopment block grants and government funding to get $1.4 million needed for a new library.

But, she said, all efforts up to now have been unsuccessful. In December, the county library decided to sign a $50,000-a-year, 5-year lease for a 6,500-square-foot building at 458 N. Maclay St.

Crismond said expanding the San Fernando Library or finding a new building has been top priority for 10 years.

“An expanded library was an important priority, and it was becoming apparent that the city could not come up with the same priority,” she said. “Leasing the facility was a compromise, but at least we have achieved our goal of expanding the library.”

In the past, both the county and city have agreed that the best site for a new library or an expansion was a next-door city-owned parcel occupied by the city’s police station. The site will be vacated when construction is completed on a new police station a block away.

However, a 1986 city ballot initiative mandates that the city get voters’ approval for the sale, lease or transfer of ownership for the old police station site.

But more than the land would be required, Crismond said.

Since the 1978 passage of Proposition 13, the county library system has not received any money for new construction.

Combination of Funding

Cities like Walnut and La Verne that have built new libraries since then have used a combination of community donations, redevelopment grants and government money to build them.

Crismond noted that those cities have had to provide a portion of the funding. For example, for its library--also costing $1.4 million--the city of La Verne contributed $312,000.

But that is something San Fernando has been unable to do, she said.

San Fernando officials said their city just doesn’t have the money to help build a new library. “San Fernando isn’t as rich as some other cities,” said Don Penman, city administrator.

He insists that the county should be doing more toward financing San Fernando’s library, which has lacked sufficient space even before Proposition 13 reduced library funding.

Conceptual Plans

“The county has to be the lead agency,” he said.

In its 1986 and 1987 budgets, the county library system earmarked $100,000 to develop conceptual plans for the San Fernando branch. But when there was no support from the city, the funds went to other projects, Crismond said.

For years, San Fernando’s efforts to finance its library have relied largely on approval of library bond measures.

Earlier this month, the state Legislature approved a bond measure authorizing $75 million in matching funds to local governments for public libraries.

Low Priority

But Crismond said the San Fernando Library would have a low priority since the city has not yet found the 35% matching funds required by the measure and because the library is moving to a larger facility.

“Now we have solved our problem, albeit temporarily,” she said.

Although the new building will have more than twice the space, the lease is a “Band-Aid” solution to the problem, Crismond said. She said the library ideally should have between 10,000 to 15,000 square feet of space, adding that the search for funds for a new structure will continue.

Penman, however, said he is afraid that the county will view the shift to new quarters as a permanent solution and that “we’re going to be left out in the cold.”

A new library is still the only proposed development the City Council has endorsed for the old police station site, Penman said. The building where the library is housed now will be taken over by the adjacent San Fernando Courthouse.

Owner Doing Renovation

Renovation of the leased library site, formerly a restaurant, is being done by the owner and should be completed by June, Crismond said.

The building will include an expanded reading room and children’s area, room to enlarge San Fernando’s collection of books in Spanish and other special sections, a bigger staff room (only one staff member can work in the present site), an office for the head librarian, more parking, and improved access for the handicapped, said Barry Shemaria, San Fernando’s head librarian.

And the new library also will have restrooms, she said.

Activity at the library has picked up in recent weeks, with the Friends of the Library meeting to hold elections and discuss details of the move. Librarians are arranging to move 45,000 books, videocassettes, copy machines and other equipment, some of which is still packed in boxes because room was never found for them.

After constantly bumping into tables, chairs and each other and having the bruises to prove it, staff members said they can’t quite believe there will finally be more room.

“After all these years of promises and promises from one source or another, I won’t believe it until we move,” said Grant.