The Sunnyvale Sun
News
Community gardeners snip at plan to expand city library
By Stephen Baxter
Designs for a new main library need a little pruning, some community gardeners said at a Sunnyvale City Council meeting June 19.
The council supported plans for a new two-story, $108 million main library, but many feared it would uproot the Charles Street community garden next to it. A voter-approved bond would pay for the library, and the council is expected to decide July 17 whether to include it on the November ballot.
A poll of 600 likely voters in May indicated 66.1 percent of residents would support a new library-- slightly less votes than the two-thirds majority it would need to pass. The survey had a reliability level of plus or minus 3.9 percentage points.
A 116,000-square-foot library at 665 W. Olive Ave. would include room to expand to 143,500 square feet and meet the city's needs to 2030. The plan would also knock out a city office building next to it. The brick library handles more than 2,000 patrons daily but lacks such common amenities as wireless Internet access. It was built in 1959 and expanded in 1969 and 1983.
Approximately 30 Charles Street gardeners attended the council meeting, many wearing the group's T-shirts and stickers.
Gardener Dan Hafeman said the teamwork and friendships that have sprouted there might not carry to a new site.
"I think it's a miracle what has happened on that Charles Street lot. I think it's a precious gem that we should somehow keep," he said.
Community gardeners gathered 1,300 signatures for a petition that urged the council to leave the garden alone.
Last year, the city leased the 1.8 -acre garden until February 2011, but council members warned gardeners of the library plans. Vegetables, flowers and other plants are grown in individual and public plots, and 1,000 pounds of food harvested there have been given to the needy.
Many gardeners panned the early ideas for replacing the garden, including one on the new library's roof or on a parking garage.
"These designs smack of nothing more than condescension for us gardeners," said garden organizer Josh Salans.
In some designs, shadows cast by the new building would block the six hours of sun that many plants need.
The council recently asked architects to incorporate the community garden in library expansion plans, but Anderson Brulé architects said privately that they only had four days to complete them. More plans are in the works, they said.
Some council members asked the gardeners to work with the architects or find a compromise rather than complain.
"We're trying to blend both worlds as best we can," said Councilman Ron Swegles. "I think we're going to wind up with something that will be a win-win situation."
Councilman Chris Moylan said the garden was a $5 million plot that the city had loaned and warned that it could be rescinded. He added that the city's library needs are 21/2 times what it has.
He said, "Sunnyvale should not be accepting second-class facilities in anything."
