While some bemoan my “fixation” regarding our history, it’s always mattered and it always will. In this case, the libraries have been around since the early 1960s when DEVCO provided space for them and volunteers ran them and provided financial support.
Over the next 50 plus years they moved numerous times; when new rec centers opened that were larger, they often got better and larger accommodations. Everyone understood the importance of having at least one good library available for the members.
When the Bell Center opened in 1976, along with it was dedicated space for the Bell Library. It was easily the biggest and best and it became immensely popular. The Friends of the Library were responsible for running it, and when i moved here in 2003, if memory serves me, they had one employee, a librarian. Otherwise it was still funded by donations and staffed with volunteers. The space was provided by the RCSC.
Change happens, whether we like it or not. The library needed a large cadre of volunteers and along with those challenges was what was happening with changes in the library’s themelves. I forget the exact name, but our library used the old card catalogue system, which was time consuming and slow. Computerization had taken book-lending into the next century and the Sun City library didn’t have the resources to adapt.
Maricopa County had a well advanced library system, given its size and money available. They took over the Bell Library and paid RCSC to lease the space. Fairway was in the process of being rebuilt, and space was allocated for a second location to serve members in the southern section of the community. That, too, had a lease attached to it. The rub was anyone could use the libraries whether they lived in Sun City or not. It was a good trade-off.
When those leases expired (circa 2012-13), the county argued their relationship with other communities where they ran libraries didn’t include leases. The space was provided for them. One of the first things we did was gather the utilization data for both locations. The numbers were staggering. The figures were some of the highest we saw compared to many other RCSC sponsored activities. Admittedly, they weren’t all Sun City residents, but we knew the largest portion of them were members.
We quickly approved not asking for a lease payment, in lieu of them staffing them and providing the books/computers and technology that came with their system. Along with it at Bell, we maintained space for the Friends of the Library a large space to collect and sell books (still staffed by volunteers). It’s been a long standing, fruitful relationship where it literally was the proverbial win/win.
It came with a fair amount of shock when I heard the rumor at the meeting yesterday there was the potential for the RCSC to tell the county they would have to pay up or lose the space. My immediate reaction was once this got out the crap would hit the fan and the uproar would cause some serious rethinking by those considering such a dumb move. I still feel that way, and given the explosion on social media and the pushback, I suspect an announcement will be forthcoming of the decision to renew those leases. We’ll see.
As I tend to do, I was trying to get my head around why this would happen? I can see a couple of reasons. The first is more long-term with societal changes regarding books and, in time, will libraries play the role they have? The second is a bit more pragmatic. The devil is always in the details when it comes to leases. For example, last summer we heard the RCSC has two long-running leases on the Bell and Georges cafes. I understand why/how we got there because finding vendors to take them was difficult. The problem was that included in those leases was the obligation for the RCSC to be responsible for maintaining the equipment in them. Yikes.
In the case of our two libraries, I have no idea what those leases say. Does it include insuring the electrical and mechanical equipment is running/operational? In that we own the buildings, I would imagine we are on the hook. We just saw the million dollar cost for two air handlers at Sundial, so my best guess is someone was looking at some fairly expensive repairs in the coming years. We know the RCSC is in the process of doing a five-year reserve study so it would fit factoring in coming expenses in those locations.
That said, these two libraries are invaluable to our community and our members. Often times they are used by those members who are under-served by the RCSC. We know many people, as they age, aren’t able to physically do what other more active members of the community do. We (the RCSC) need to look at this exactly like they do the numbers visiting our pools, fitness centers or club rooms. Sorry, but it is the cost of running a community for all the members.
