It's been more than five months since the Springfield City Council voted to take the Urban League building at 765 State Street and return it to its previous use, as a branch library for the Mason Square neighborhood. So why is the Urban League still in the building?
Last August's vote by the City Council was supposed to resolve the controversy over the 2003 sale of the building to the Urban League by the Springfield Library and Museums Association, the private organization that then ran the city library system. The SLMA had made the deal with no public input, despite the fact that the city gave major financial support to the library, including bonding for about half the cost of $1.2 million renovations done shortly before the sale. The Urban League, meanwhile, walked away with a steal, paying just $700,000 for the newly renovated building.
Not long after, the city took control of the library system, and in 2004, Pat Markey (then city solicitor to Mayor Charlie Ryan) sued the SLMA and won a $333,000 settlement to be used for a new library for Mason Square. After months of searching, unsuccessfully, for a new site, public sentiment—with at least some political backing—mounted for simply taking back the old library by eminent domain.
In mid-September, the Urban League was officially notified that it needed to vacate the building. The city hired, as required by law, a relocation specialist to handle the transition, including helping the Urban League find a new home. But now, as the months pass, library supporters are frustrated at how little movement has been made.
Last week, the city's Library Commission voted to send a letter to Mayor Domenic Sarno urging him to speed up the process of reclaiming the Mason Square branch. Commissioner Sheila McElwaine said the board had been informed by a city attorney that the relocation expert has met with Urban League officials just one time so far; the lack of activity was attributed to the fact that Urban League President Henry Thomas, and then the consultant, had been on vacation.
City Solicitor Ed Pikula told the Advocate that the city has been moving the effort forward, although there have been delays in the process; Thomas, for instance, was out of town for a time, which prevented him from investigating potential new sites. (Thomas has not returned calls from the Advocate about the library issue.)
The city, Pikula added, has moved carefully on the matter in light of the Urban League's threats to sue over the taking. "We don't want to give them a reason to take us to court," Pikula said. "We want to show that we're being cooperative and bending over backwards to try to prevent any disruptions. We want to make sure the services they provide for the community continue to be provided. We don't want there to be a gap in time where their services aren't available."
Still, the end might be in sight: Pikula, the Facilities Management department and an architect hired by the city have been looking at what, if any, work needs to be done to turn the building back into a library. For that work to happen, he said, the Urban League should be out in May, with a projected re-opening of the library in November.
McElwaine said that while she supports the Law Department's "strategy of steady, incremental progress in relocating the [Urban League]," she thinks "this means something more active than having one meeting in two months." "I am not surprised that the [Urban League] has been slow to act—one would expect anybody in their position to be less than enthusiastic about moving, but I would like the city's activity level to reflect the urgency felt by the community, which has been waiting for seven years for restoration of a full-sized branch library," McElwaine continued.
City Councilor Tim Rooke said he was "dumbfounded" to learn that the Urban League has yet to leave the building, and suggested that the foot-dragging might have some basis in the Urban League's political influence. (Thomas is a heavy campaign contributor whose donations have included large checks to Sarno's campaign. Sarno, who initially did not support the taking, has told the Advocate that Thomas' donations had no bearing on his position.)
Rooke called for the city to stop cutting the Urban League breaks. "Why [is the city] bending over backwards at the expense of the neighborhood?" he asked. "They're going to sue anyway."
