Palmdale Library Loses Chance for State Funds

Eight minutes late and $15 million short.

That is the story in Palmdale, which lost a chance for a state grant to fund about two-thirds of its planned $25-million city library when part of its application to state officials in Sacramento arrived minutes after closing time Friday, city officials said Monday.

Because the city was late in providing legal title information about the proposed site for the planned 90,306-square-foot facility, state officials refused to accept the 325-page application that city officials spent months preparing in hopes of getting about $15.2 million. Preparation costs were estimated to be thousands of dollars.

There was no guarantee that the city would have gotten the grant, however, since only one-fourth of the money that was applied for was available.

“It’s a real shock,” said city Librarian Linda Storsteen, who spent months preparing the document. “But we just have to go on from here.”

A prior snafu over whether the city in fact owned its proposed Civic Center site had led the state to reject another application earlier this year. Future requests will have to wait until the next time voters approve a new statewide library bonds measure.