Panel Targets $16-Million Library Expansion as Too Expensive : Budget: Committee recommends that furniture and art costs be scaled back at Peninsula Center facility, and may call for halt to construction. Project has been focus of this year’s board election.

A special committee has called on Palos Verdes Library District officials to scale back the controversial $16-million expansion of the Peninsula Center Library, targeting plans to spend $1.5 million on new furniture and $274,000 on artwork, as well as the board’s contract decisions.

The 15-member committee, created by the library’s Board of Trustees last summer as the district was facing a fiscal crisis, also plans to recommend that more consultants’ work be put out to bid.

The committee’s assessments, released during a series of public meetings over the past two weeks, have not yet been considered by the board. The recommendations are being fine-tuned and the board is expected to take them up in three weeks.

The expansion, which began in March and was expected to be completed in January 1995, will more than double the size of the library from 36,000 square feet to 82,000 and will include the addition of several meeting rooms and space for 200 more seats.

Officials in the district, which is supported by taxpayers in the four Palos Verdes Peninsula cities, have said demand for services has outgrown the building’s capacity, and it needed to be upgraded to withstand earthquakes.

The expansion project already has become a lightning rod in this year’s district board election race.

The committee may decide tonight whether to recommend that construction on the library’s second floor be halted and instead focus on improvements to the district’s two branch libraries, Miraleste and Malaga Cove.

The committee has not said how much could be saved under its recommendations.

The central point of the recommendations has been that the expansion plans are outdated and out of step with the district’s current funding, said Virginia Warren, chairwoman of the panel, which is called the Creative Solutions Committee.

“These are plans from 1991, but we’re in 1993,” Warren said. “Times have changed. To proceed with the projects as if the district were still rich is neglecting that fact.”

Much of the expansion was to be funded by a $16-million bond issue that voters passed in 1991. But since then the district has suffered from cutbacks in state funding, which forced it to cut back hours at the two branches and Sunday hours at Peninsula Center.

The expansion issue has provided fodder for the district election on Nov. 2, with three challengers criticizing the expansion as excessive and the three incumbents supporting the work.

Board President Janet Smith, who is running for reelection, said the board’s decisions were “made with the best interests of the community at the time.”

Because voters have passed the bond issue, halting the project “would be a harsh decision for the board to make because it would go contrary to the will of the people,” she said.

Board members Teresa Sun and Elliott J. Hahn have agreed.

But challenger Harold Jesse mocked the board’s decision, saying, “The mentality was, ‘Let’s build a new building. Everything should be new.’ ” Candidates Alice La Mar and Steven Peden also have lashed out at the plans.

Whoever wins the race will determine the future of the project. The board will receive the recommendations Nov. 11, although no vote on them is expected until much later.

The committee’s recommendations have included:

* Deferring delivery of furniture and equipment. One of the committee’s studies on district facilities concluded that about $900,000 in furniture contracts be reviewed or canceled. The committee suggested that the money would be better spent using existing furniture or buying used furniture from companies that are scaling back operations.

* Cutting back on $274,000 in public artwork for the new facility, including two large bronze cheetahs, an itaglio column, stone and mosaic works, etched glass and gold-leaf treatments. The committee said that the district should try to raise money to fund the artwork through public donations, or defer spending on those already in progress.

* Putting more professional services to bid. The district does not have to go through a public bidding process to hire firms for professional services, which included $9,750 for an art consultant and $475,000 for a project manager. Committee members believed the district could get lower prices for the work and make the board more accountable.

Library Director Linda Elliott defended the project spending and said some of the committee’s recommendations would not save much money.

The furniture, she said, has to be specially ordered and would be tough to find from companies scaling back or going out of business. Workstations and study booths also have to be built to accommodate new computer systems, she said.

Leaving the second floor incomplete would be imprudent because much of the work is already finished.

Much of the artwork has already been commissioned, and officials would have to pay for what has been completed.

As for the bidding, district officials said that they advertise in trade journals to try to get a wide range of estimates when seeking professional services.

“Even though we didn’t follow the bid procedure, we followed the same process,” Elliott said.