By Ta’Leah Van Sistine, community reporter/editor
It’s been almost four months since the L.E. Phillips Memorial Public Library reopened at its temporary location, not far from Festival Foods and Savers.
At 2725 Mall Drive, the library currently resides in a much smaller space, compared to the original location, and it also has a portion of its collection in storage at a nearby facility. Isa Small, the library’s manager for programming and communications services, said the size decrease has indeed affected what can be offered.
“We do not have any room for library programs, a makerspace or meeting rooms for community members to use,” Small said in an email. “We are really looking forward to being back in our expanded building where we will have more space than ever for these services.”
Small said she and other staff are glad most library services are still available to customers while construction continues on the original location — an $18.5 million project that will add roughly 6,800 square feet.
“We’ve heard from customers how they appreciate that the temporary space truly feels like a library,” Small said. “They appreciate being able to come in and pick up holds, use a computer, browse the collection and see staff after having limited services due to COVID.”
This year has been far from “normal”: in addition to the ongoing pandemic, the library also had reduced hours this summer, so staff could do more outreach.
Even so, Small said the library has been averaging slightly over 650 customers per day at the temporary location and will expand its hours after Labor Day.
The construction on the original library is a complete renovation, which requires all systems to be turned off. Small said the library needed a temporary location because it would have been extremely challenging to serve the community without these systems.
Construction would have taken much longer as well, if the library continued to operate in the downtown location, because the construction crew would have needed to work around library services, in addition to library staff having to work around them.
Need for renovation and construction
Small said in 2017, a Building and Feasibility Study and Space Needs Analysis conducted by Zimmerman Architectural Studios, Inc. concluded that several systems in the library’s downtown building needed updating.
“Major issues included the roof, (heating, ventilation and air conditioning), electrical, data, plumbing and fire alarm systems,” Small said. “The facility also had serious accessibility and safety problems like outdated restrooms, uneven pavement, narrow spaces between bookcases, aging electrical and plumbing systems and overuse of high and low shelves.”
According to the library’s website, the downtown building first opened in 1976 and underwent a renovation in 2009 to “enlarge Youth Services, make necessary improvements to Adult Services and introduce technological upgrades.”
However, Small said the population the library serves has grown exponentially since the downtown facility was first constructed and the library’s square footage had not increased despite the 2009 renovation.
“We desperately needed more space for public meeting rooms, library programming, a larger makerspace and books and other materials,” Small said.
The City of Eau Claire is providing $11.5 million for the library’s construction project and the library has also launched the Story Builder capital campaign to raise the remaining $7 million.
The Story Builder homepage shows there is still $557,664 needed in private funds for the project. The library is using its website, newsletter, social media and customer emails to share monthly updates from Market & Johnson, the project’s contractor.
Contributions can be made online through the Eau Claire Community Foundation (www.eccfwi.org). Full information about the project and ways to donate is available here.
NOTE: the photos accompanying this article were provided by the L. E. Phillips Memorial Public Library.