The conflict in this case is the naming of the community hall building after a donor who has agreed to give $250,000 to the project.

As part of a fundraising campaign to raise $1.2 million to furnish the library, a list of structures that included the community hall for naming opportunities was created and approved in July 2002.

When Mayor Michael Chang found a major donor to give $250,000 to the project in exchange for a plaque to be placed on the buiilding with the donor's name, the disagreement surfaced.

Although there's no dispute over the list itself, Vice Mayor Sandra James says she believed when they put the community hall on the list, donor plaques would only apply to interior rooms, not the whole building.

However, the rest of the city council members say they believed putting the community hall on the list meant a plaque with the donor's name would be placed on the outside of the building.

On March 17 council voted to decide again whether the community hall should be on the list or not. Four council members voted to keep the building on the list. James voted against it.

"I don't believe in selling the rights to name a public building paid with taxpayers' money," James said at the April 7 council meeting. "I don't see a problem with naming the rooms inside the building, but the building should not be for sale. And until the residents tell me they want that, I will always vote against it."

Mayor Michael Chang, on the other hand, said, "What makes me uncomfortable is how this issue has become sensationalized now. In terms of using the language of 'selling the building,' I think we have to be consistent. We are selling the rooms in the library, the plaza and the courtyard; we're selling everything. So either we support the library foundation with the concept of raising money with recognition or not. I am just asking for some integrity and consistency in this process."

The project, which includes the construction of a $22 million 54,000-square-foot library, a 3,000-square-foot community hall and a civic plaza, began six years ago and is expected to be completed in October 2004.

Since the city was only able to pitch in $20.8 million for the library, it was decided that the Cupertino Library Foundation would carry out a fundraising campaign to raise the remaining $1.2 million.

Donors would get recognition by having plaques with their names placed in various areas, such as the library courtyard and the civic plaza fountains.

James said that when she approved the original list of naming items last July, she thought the item of the community hall meant the interior of the building, not the structure itself.

She said, "I do believe the original list didn't include a building, and I am on the record with that. I do believe we talked about the interior and exterior features of the community hall but not the building itself. I feel strongly that the building is a public building paid for by the taxpayers and should not have an individual's name on it. The community hall and the library should not be for sale."

Dorothy Stow, president of the Cupertino Library Foundation and one of the original three people who created the list, said she never intended to include the building on the list, only the rooms inside the building.

She said, "I am personally not in favor of selling naming rights to a public building. After all, the residents have paid for it with their taxes."

James' concern about putting a name on a public building is that the city does not know the individual donors and is running a serious risk by doing so.

She used an example of an award-winning coach at a local university who has recently been accused of rape.

She said, "We don't know who these people are. When we allow someone to put their name on a public building paid for with taxpayers' money, how do we know what they're going to do in the future?"

Chang argued the risk of putting a "rapist's" name on a room or a courtyard is equally high and questioned why some people are scrutinizing the building but not the other public structures.

He said, "The same list has existed since last July and in eight months, there hasn't been a single issue raised by James or anyone from the community. It was only when a donor was solicited that suddenly there was all this concern. Again I am just asking for some consistency here."

In terms of the confusion over what the original list included, Chang said, "Four of the five of us on the council thought it was the whole building."

Chang said he would have accepted the list either way, but it should have been communicated better so as not to let people solicit donations with an ambiguous understanding.

Some council members are concerned that the argument over the issue might interfere with the library foundation's fundraising efforts.

Councilman Patrick Kwok said, "The integrity of the library foundation is very important. We have empowered the foundation to go out and solicit funding, and the foundation needs to move forward."

At the end of the discussion, the council agreed that Mayor Chang and Vice Mayor James would work with city staff to devise a policy on naming future city facilities.