The Independent - 5.14.2007 - by Richard Roth
$100K gift spurs new library plan
HILLSDALE-The Hudson River Bank and Trust Company Foundation has pledged
$100,000 to the Roeliff Jansen Community Library over a five-year period,
bringing the library one-third of the way toward reaching its $1.8 million
goal for funding a new library.
The library, formerly known as the Hillsdale Library, has outgrown the
1,600-square-foot building on Route 23 that was dedicated in 1925. And funds
are being raised to build a new 7,500-square-foot library just south of the
Hillsdale hamlet in the Town of Copake.
The lobby of the new facility will be named in honor of the Hudson
River Bank and Trust Company Foundation. Applications for additional funding
are on file with other large donors including Key Bank, First Niagara Bank
and the Rheinstrom Hill Community Foundation.
The library started with a capital fund of $300,000, and the library's
Board of Trustees and the Friends of the Library group have pledged
individual donations totaling approximately $65,000. The fundraising
campaign has been limited to members of the "direct library family" so far,
according to fundraising campaign director Nina Mankin. But the public phase
could begin within the next couple of months.
"Normally, you want to raise half of your money from big donors before
you start raising money from the public," said library board President Ned
Schneier. "We think we'll be at that stage around the Fourth of July."
The library owns nine acres just north of the old Roe Jan High School,
and preliminary plans are being developed for the new building. "We have a
very good idea what the inside will look like," said Ms. Mankin. "The
building committee has spent many hours fitting all they need into the
7,500-square-foot footprint."
Ms. Mankin said the committee is working with the New York State
Energy Research and Development Agency (NYSERDA) to have the project
accepted into the agency's "green building" program, and that "will have
some repercussions" on the materials that are used and the building's
exterior appearance.
NYSERDA underwrites 75% of the additional cost of green technology
over conventional materials and systems for both public and private
buildings accepted into the green building program, according to Ms. Mankin.
A number of private projects in Columbia County have been designed to
utilize green technology. But NYSERDA is particularly excited at the
prospect of being involved in the library project, Ms. Mankin said, because
it will be readily accessible to members of the public.
"A public building becomes a showcase and an educational forum for
green technology that they don't usually get access to," said Ms. Mankin.
"That will really add a lot to the community. It will be a showcase for us."
The old library building on Route 23 will be put up for sale. But
library trustees are working toward having it designated as a historic
landmark, and they hope to see the building used for some public purpose.
A number of people have suggested that it would be an ideal Town Hall,
and Mr. Schneier said the trustees would probably be willing to sell it at a
below-market price if the town were to express an interest. But the matter
has not yet come before the Hillsdale Town Board.
Several private individuals have approached the library. "We've gotten
offers for half a million but we're not entertaining them," said Ms. Mankin.
"It's important that the building remain in the public sphere in some way,
and there are a number of different creative ways that could happen."
Mr. Schneier said the first steps toward construction on the new site
will include building a road and installing a geothermal well to provide
heat for the new library. "We hope to break ground in 2008," said Mr.
Schneier.
The Roeliff Jansen Community Library is a free association library
that serves the communities of Hillsdale, Copake and Ancram. The library's
website is
www.roejanlibrary.org.
Go to Top
How Green Is Your Library?
With land acquired and preliminary site plans sketched out,
the Roeliff Jansen Community Library is looking toward greener pastures -
and buildings.
After a meeting last week with the New York
State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA), the new Roe-Jan
Library may be able to receive grant monies to help its building go green.
On a 26-point scale set by NYSERDA, the
preliminary site plans scored 29 points, which would qualify the building
for 75-percent funding for what it takes to make the building more
sustainable.
"It would be an enormous savings on operating
costs once the library is open," said Ned Schneier, Library Board of
Trustees, president.
For example, Schneier said some of the
stipulations would require 80-percent of the materials to come from a
500-mile radius of the library.
In the plans, Schneier said the library plans
to use geothermal heating and cooling as well as solar panels on the roof.
"NYSERDA is not only hoping we can be a
wonderful library, but also an exhibit for the public," he said. "They
love funding libraries because they are open to the public, not like an
office building. People will be able to see what a green building is
like."
The plan includes the use of windows and
energy-efficient lights to help conserve energy throughout the day.
"There will be an enormous savings on
operating costs once the library opens," said Schneier. "We will
probably spend less on heat and electricity for the newer, larger building
than we do now. And, that's our hope."
By the first of March, a fundraising
committee and chairs of the committee will be chosen in order to allow "The
From Dream to Reality Capital Campaign" to kick-off fundraising efforts at
the end of March.
The Taconic Telephone Company, a subsidiary
of Fairpoint Communications Inc. of Chatham, donated office space in Copake
to use as the capital campaign's headquarters.
The Board of Trustees is in the process of
getting the Library Family - board members and friends of the library to
donate the initial funding.
"If we can come up with $75,000 to $100,000,
we'll be very happy," Schneier said. "The board is made up of school
teachers and librarians - we won't be able to donate $1 million each."
The fundraising goal for the library is set
for $1.8 million for the building, with $250,000 in an endowment fund.
Schneier said plans won't be ready to go to
the town of Copake Planning Board until the money is in place.
"Further development depends on our ability
to raise the money," he said.
The library sought to expand when a
consultant was hired in 2002 to see what improvements could be made to the
existing 1,600 square-foot Hillsdale building.
It was hoped that an addition could be added,
but given the size of the current property - less than two acres - and the
size of the community served, expanding was not feasible.
The nine-acre plot of land on Route 22 in
Copake, just north of the old Roe-Jan school, was bought in 2004 for
$60,000, but may not be big enough according to zoning laws.
Copake zoning laws state any library must be
on at least 10 acres of land.
"It's a weird sort of thing," sand Schneier.
"The town, when they were forming zoning laws, probably took it from another
town's boiler plate. It really is a no-brainer, the old library is not
even on two acres."
The nine acres is bordered by a stream and
wetland. Although the library does not own them, they may be able to
be considered as part of the acreage. The Library Board will have to
go through an appeals process with the Zoning Board prior to construction.
For more information about the building
program, visit www.roejanlibrary.org
or call Nina Mankin, capital campaign manager, at 329-0182 or 646-221-0235.
Ned Schneier may also be reached at 329-0460.
Kate Birchenough
Register Star, Hudson, NY
January 31, 2007
Go to Top
Roeliff Jansen library campaign finds headquarters
Copake - The Taconic Telephone Co., a subsidiary of Fairpoint
Communications, Inc. of Chatham, has donated office space at their Copake
Service Center facility to the Roeliff Jansen Community Library for use as
their From Dream to Reality Capital Campaign Office.
Taconic Telephone Co. donated the space for one year at a fee of $12 for the
year. The new office is located at 121 Route 7A.
"This is an incredibly generous and vitally important contribution to our
campaign," Ned Schneier, president of the Roeliff Jansen Community Library
Board of Trustees said in a press release. "We are extremely grateful to
Fairpoint Communications for helping the library continue to serve the
communities of Ancram, Copake and Hillsdale for now and into the future."
The From Dream to Reality Capital Campaign is in its preliminary stages and
will launch publicly in the spring. The campaign will raise $1.8 million for
a new 7,500 square foot Roeliff Jansen Community Library facility to be
located on Route 22 just north of the old Roe Jan High School.
Peter Mercer, director of operations at Taconic Telephone Co., and Stosh
Gansowski, manager of the Service Center, facilitated the donation of office
space, the release said.
For more information about the campaign, call Nina Mankin, campaign
director, (518) 329-0182, (646) 221-0235 or
ncmankin@gmail.com
<mailto:ncmankin@gmail.com> ; Stosh
Gansowski, Taconic Telephone Co. Service Center manager 329-1609; or Ned
Schneier, library board of trustees
president, (518)-329-0460.
The Independent
January 19, 2007
Go to Top
Richard Roth
ŠThe
Independent September 16, 2005
Go To Top
Hillsdale Library Board Envisions New Building
Hillsdale
Public Library patrons gather around the desk of library Director Carol
Briggs,
who will find herself in larger quarters if plans recently unveiled by the
library's Board of Trustees are successful. Photo by
David Lee
HILLSDALE-The Hillsdale Public Library, cramped for space and unable
to expand at its current site on Route 23 in the hamlet, hopes to
build new quarters on a 9-acre plot on Route 22 immediately north of
the Roe Jan School.
A public meeting on the proposed move will take place at the
Hillsdale Fire Department from
10 a.m.
until noon on Saturday, March 13.
Holdings have more than tripled, services have been updated to
include a computer room with multiple work stations, and the number of
residents served has increased by ten times since the Georgian-style
library was built in 1924. A study by library consultant Patience
Kenney Jackson, begun in the spring of 2002, found the facility
"critically undersized."
Subsequent investigations by the architectural firm of Best/Joslin,
a
Windsor, Connecticut, specialist in library design, examined the
possibility of adding enough interior space to accommodate current and
future holdings, expanding parking facilities, and making badly needed
upgrades to the building's water and sewer systems.
But the architects' study determined that building an addition
to the existing library was not feasible for a number of reasons:
*A steep rock ledge behind the building would make expansion
northward prohibitively expensive and impractical for either an
addition to the building or for additional parking spaces.
*The storm drain field to the building's east means an addition
to the existing building is possible only if the addition is two
stories high; and a two-story building would require additional
full-time staff as well as an elevator to comply with current laws for
handicapped access.
*Existing setback regulations reduce even further the area of
the library's triangular-shaped property, which is suitable for
expansion.
The library's Building Committee began searching in the spring
of 2003 for one of two things: an existing building which would be
suitable for conversion, or an appropriate site for a new building.
"It involved many conversations with realtors, the Columbia
Land Conservancy, numerous owners of many parcels of land and
buildings," according to a press release from the building committee.
Although "numerous and varied local suggestions" proved inadequate for
the library's needs, the search eventually led to Weir Stewart's
parcel adjacent to the old Roe Jan School.
The 9.03-acre site overlooks the Roeliff Jansen Kill and would
allow for ample parking and green space. "[Mr. Stewart] has helped the
Building Committee locate flood maps and other critical information,
and most importantly, has offered the picturesque parcel to the
Library at a very modest price," says the press release.
Because it relies heavily on volunteers, the library operates
on a total annual budget of "just under $75,000," according to
Treasurer Leah Wilcox. "That covers salary, buying books, maintaining
the building, paying the utilities, everything that has to do with
operating the library," said Ms. Wilcox. "We try to be very careful
and get a lot done."
Approximately $15,000 comes from Columbia County and the Towns
of Ancram, Copake and Hillsdale, Ms. Wilcox said, and the balance is
donated by members of the community.
The library recently petitioned the state Department of
Education to amend its charter to include Ancram and Copake in its
official service area. The library has served Hillsdale and Copake
since its founding 90 years ago, and Ancram residents have been
eligible for library cards for the past 16 years.
Kenneth Best, a principal in the architectural firm, said Best/Joslin
was still in the very earliest design stages.
"We're just starting to work, looking at site organization,
parking, taking advantage of the view, those sorts of things," said
Mr. Best, who said he was "not sure that we're going to be going with
Georgian style" because "it's a different scale of building."
Once a design is in place and a contractor has been selected,
Mr. Best said construction would take about ten months. But, he said,
"Obviously a lot of things have to happen before we get to that
point."
There are no plans as yet for the building on Route 23,
according to building committee spokesperson Kelley Hersey. "It's
going to take a long time to get this finalized," said Ms. Hersey.
"There are no plans except to hold onto
the building for now."
Richard Roth
ŠThe
Independent February 24, 2004
Go To Top
