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18 library branches get leases

Wednesday, December 11, 2002

By Timothy McNulty, Post-Gazette Staff Writer

A slim City Council majority and a county judge silenced critics like a shushing librarian yesterday, rejecting requests for a public hearing on lease agreements with the Carnegie Library.

In a 5-4 vote, council rejected a call for a public hearing on the leases, which will allow the library to buy and sell some neighborhood branches and replace them with new ones. It then gave final approval to the 29-year leases, with one change requiring council approval for any sales of the city-owned facilities.

Allegheny County Common Pleas Judge Robert Gallo also rejected an order forcing a public hearing, saying he did not want to interfere with legislative branch proceedings.

The Carnegie Library has never had formal leases for its city-owned buildings, going back to the 1890s when Andrew Carnegie, Mary Schenley and city government reached various agreements to build the main branch in Oakland. It now wants them to facilitate fund raising and renovations of the main branch in Oakland and 17 neighborhood branches.

The leases would allow the library to buy the city-owned buildings for $100 each. It could sell some of the branches and replace them with new facilities in the same neighborhood if the existing facilities are judged to be too small, aged or in a poor location. Money from the sales would be plowed back into library renovation funds.

A citizen's group asked Friday for a public hearing on the lease legislation, and yesterday morning a lawyer for the group, Jonathan Robison, asked Gallo for an order commanding council to hold the hearing before taking final action.

Robison said the bill was changed Wednesday to include the sales language, and the public has a right to weigh in on those changes. Assistant City Solicitor Paulo Nzambi said Robison missed the city charter deadline for a hearing, which was three days after the leases were introduced on Nov. 25.

At the council session, councilman Jim Ferlo also pleaded for a hearing but was rejected 5-4. Ferlo, Alan Hertzberg, Bob O'Connor and William Peduto cast the losing votes. Hertzberg and Peduto supported the lease agreements but also supported hearing from the public on the issue. But others rejected the hearing, saying opponents had weeks to study the lease and sales language before yesterday's vote, and that the petitions for hearings were filed too late.

The leases themselves were approved 7-2, with Ferlo and O'Connor voting no. Most supported the sales option -- the most controversial part of the leases -- saying it was necessary to pay for library upgrades that city government cannot fund from its budget.

The amendment requiring council's approval of sales -- in addition to approvals by the mayor, city solicitor and General Services director -- was passed unanimously.