The City Council will not, after all, vote tonight on whether to issue an eviction notice to get the Urban League out of 765 State St., which the Council took by eminent domain in August of 2009 in order to restore full library services to the Mason Square neighborhood.
But that doesn’t mean library supporters shouldn’t show up to tonight’s Council meeting to make their voices heard. Still on the agenda tonight is an order to accept $196,000 from the private Springfield Library Foundation to fund the first phase of repairs necessary before the building can be re-opened as a library. The SLF administers a trust fund left by the late Annie Curran to support library services in Mason Square.
While tonight’s vote, by itself, is a fairly straightforward affair, it does present an opportunity for residents to ask some important questions, starting with why the Urban League has stayed in the building so long after it was taken by the City Council. The moving date for the agency—and, consequently, the re-opening date for the library—has been repeatedly pushed back; now, the Urban League says it doesn’t expect to move out until Nov. 15, which would mean Mason Square won’t get its library back before January of 2011, at the earliest. The Republican reported yesterday that Urban League President Henry Thomas (who hasn’t returned calls from the Advocate about the library for a few years now) said the agency’s move was “held up initially by the need to find a suitable new location, then by the need to reach a lease agreement, and now by the need to construct and pay for a fire wall to comply with the fire code at the new site.”
While the eviction vote initially planned for tonight’s meeting has been tabled, City Solicitor Ed Pikula told the Republican the matter could come up again, if the Urban League doesn’t hit the Nov. 15 moving date. Pikula also said the city is working on an agreement with the Urban League under which the agency will pay the city for its continued use of 765 State St. Critics have questioned the city’s failure to collect that fee thus far; some have also criticized the city for not being more aggressive in its efforts to get the Urban League to vacate the building.
Tonight’s meeting, it’s hoped, will give residents a chance to ask about the entire process—and maybe even get some answers.
The City Council meeting begins at 7:30, which the public speak-out period starting at 6:45.
