Published Wednesday, May 07, 2008
Senoia joins county library system
The Times-Herald
The Senoia City Council approved a resolution joining the Coweta County Library System Monday night, but the council is delaying action on a new library design until the city has a cooperating agreement with the library system.
The resolution joining the library system was just a "housekeeping" matter, said Mayor Robert Belisle.
The city appointed a member to the county library board last year, and has been participating in board meetings and everything else, but hadn't officially voted to join the system.
"We never had made that action in council," said City Administrator Richard Ferry, who serves as Senoia's representative on the Coweta County Library System Board of Trustees. "They had approved me to go to the meetings last year, and assumed that was what we needed to do. But we were notified that we needed to take an additional step," he said.
The city plans to hire Historical Concepts, a Peachtree City architectural firm, to come up with a conceptual design for the new library, which will be located adjacent to the city park at Merrimac Lakes.
The council recently purchased the lot next to the park for the library. The lot had been purchased by then-Mayor Robert Hannah right around the same time that the city bought the park. Hannah did not disclose the purchase, and it became an issue in the mayor's race later that year, when Hannah was defeated by Belisle.
The city previously had been planning for two years to build its new library in the Seavy Street Park. After extensive design work, the state's director of library facilities told the city he didn't care for the Seavy Street location. Soon after, Gov. Sonny Perdue vetoed the $1.2 million in the state budget for the library.
The money is back in the fiscal year 2009 budget, though. It still awaits the governor's signature. And the facilities director highly recommended that the city put the library in the Pylant Park. The park itself was off limits, however, because of the limitations of a grant that was used toward the purchase price.
Historical Concepts will do the conceptual exterior plan, and then an architect will be hired through the normal bid process.
With Senoia having the design done itself, hopes are that the problems with the last design can be avoided.
"They're going to be tasked with determining how to make that building look so that it compliments both the park and the historic district," Ferry said. "We'll have an architectural drawing to hand to whoever is the architect."
The library will likely be designed to take in the view of the lakes.
Ferry said he hopes that the council will have a draft cooperating agreement to consider in the next month or so. However, the library board only meets quarterly.
In other meeting business:
* The Senoia City Council voted to move forward with repairing the roof at city hall. The project is being funded with a local assistance grant from the state.
* The council approved a contract with Cbeyond for phone and Internet service for city hall, the police department, and public works.
* Councilman Larry Owens encouraged everyone to check out the Art Senoia exhibit, which is on display weekends through Memorial Day, at 20 Main Street. For more information contact Suzanne Helfman at 770-599-8182 or Claudia Wood at 770-599-0047.
Owens said he always knew "we had some talented people in town," but when he actually saw all the artwork, which is by local artists, he was amazed. "I didn't know we had as many talented artists in town as we do. I certainly enjoyed it!"
* The council's May 19 meeting will be held at the newly remodeled Freeman Sasser building in the Seavy Street Park. The meeting had to be moved before of a conflict with city court.