Del Mar Council Keeps Drive for a New Library in Limbo : Finances: Council plans a workshop but declines to put a previously supported $3.1-million plan on the ballot.

Slumped on a couch, waiting for the Del Mar City Council to again consider the issue of a new library, Pat Freeman resolved to push forward.

“I’ve been working on this for four years,” said the president of Friends of the Del Mar Library. “At this point I just want a conclusion.”

Hoping for the council to put a library plan on the November ballot--or, at the very least, offer a sign of support for the library concept--Freeman got neither at this week’s meeting.

Instead, a motion to reaffirm the council’s support for a $3.1-million design, favored in March by the previous council, failed to win approval Monday as the panel deadlocked, 2 to 2, after a 90-minute discussion. The council did offer library supporters a glimmer of hope, however, by agreeing to stage a workshop in July in an attempt to settle the issues that have plagued efforts to build a new library in this small city.

“It’s another delay,” Freeman said as she left the meeting. “We’ve had one after another; what’s one more?”

In the wake of the council’s indecision, library supporters say they will move ahead with plans for an initiative to force the council to place the question of a stand-alone library on the ballot, to find out once and for all whether Del Mar residents are ready to support the concept.

In January, a new library was part of a $4.5-million plan for a 23,000-square-foot community center, including a city hall, that was soundly defeated by voters after a divisive and often bitter campaign. Opponents charged that the project was too expensive considering the current fiscal climate, and that the city miscalculated the true cost of the project.

Undeterred by the defeat, library proponents are now severing the library from long-range plans for a city hall, hoping to move ahead in the next few years.

The existing library, part of the county library system, is housed in a 2,000-square-foot mobile building on a dirt parking lot behind City Hall, at 11th Street and Camino del Mar.

“There is no ventilation, no office space for the staff, it doesn’t even separate the adult section from the children’s section,” said Jacqueline Winterer, former mayor and longtime library supporter.

Friends of the Del Mar Library, which has about 400 members, including many who live in communities outside the city limits, is backing a version of the community complex proposal, designed by New York architect Robert Stern, which voters rejected in January.

The plan calls for a 9,000-square-foot stucco and wood library, complete with conference rooms, office space, open ceilings with exposed beams and a separate space for children.

In March, the City Council, after sifting through several versions of the plan, opted for one that includes underground parking. The total price tag: $3.1 million.

Friends of the Library has pledged to raise at least $400,000 of that. The city will also receive $50,000 a year for the next 16 years from developer Jim Watkins, who agreed to pay the money into a library fund as part of a deal to develop the Del Mar Hotel site.

The city would have to assume responsibility for the rest of the financing, probably through a bond offering.

The council appeared to be moving toward supporting the plan, but in April two new members were elected: Ed Colbert, who opposed the community complex plan, and Henry Abarbanel, who was supported by the environmentally oriented Greens. On Monday, both voted against reaffirming the council’s March support of the Stern plan.

Colbert said he is against the fee schedules and other “technical aspects” of the plan; Abarbanel was against the underground parking structure, one of the most expensive elements of the proposal. (Councilwoman Jan McMillan abstained from the discussion because she lives within 300 feet of portions of the project, a fact that invokes Del Mar’s strict conflict-of-interest rules.)

Although much of the debate centers around whether or not the community needs a library of that size, and whether it can afford underground parking, the cost of the project has been its most controversial aspect.

“To take on the obligation we’re talking about now, I don’t think it is appropriate now to commit to a library of this size,” said former Mayor Lew Hopkins, who helped lead the opposition to the community center plan. A library is being built in Carmel Valley, just to the east of Del Mar, he pointed out.

The city simply can’t afford a new library, especially considering the uncertain times, community activist Piero Ariotti told the council Monday night. It’s not that the city is broke, but there are other things it can spend money on, such as a new fire station or finishing the Powerhouse Park project, he said.

“The question is, does Del Mar want to afford” a new library, he said.

To put the library on the ballot would be a “disaster,” Ariotti said, coming so soon after the January vote.

“I think people have shown that they don’t want a library at this price,” he said.

Hopkins agreed that a ballot initiative on this particular library plan would face a stiff battle, since many will see it as simply a reiteration of the community center debate.

“The library they are proposing to go forward with is exactly the same as the one in the community center,” Hopkins said. “I think there would be a lot of opposition.”

One alternative is to design a bare-bones library, without underground parking or other amenities. It may be cheaper and easier to finance, but library supporters prefer the more comprehensive plan.

Yet they say they are willing to compromise on details.

“We’re willing to take it with underground parking, we’re willing to do without underground parking,” Freeman said. “We just want a library.”

Winterer said library supporters will gladly support whatever plan the council produces from its July workshop. Then they want to put it to a vote, to let the public deliver a clear mandate, pro or con.

The council sent a clear message in Monday’s meeting that library supporters should move ahead with a ballot measure, giving the council a specific ballot statement to consider, Winterer said.

“We have nothing this council can put on the ballot right now,” Mayor Rod Franklin said at one point, staring at the library supporters.

There is a risk in putting the issue to voters so soon after the January defeat, supporters concede. Another defeat could put an end to any hope of building a new library in the near future.

But library proponents may have learned some lessons from the January election.

“I think we have to put out more information about the library and do it quicker,” Freeman said.

At this point, they simply want to move forward.

“I can’t see any point in waiting. We’ll lose momentum and people will lose interest,” she said. “I don’t really want to start all over.”