The Ella Johnson Memorial Public Library District is seeking voter permission to issue $30 million in bonds to pay for two new facilities in Hampshire and Pingree Grove.
Courtesy of Marissa Lambert
The Ella Johnson Memorial Public Library District will ask voters in November to approve an expansion plan in response to a residential growth spurt.
The roughly 7,000-square-foot library now serves patrons from Hampshire and neighboring towns.
“Hampshire and Pingree Grove, in particular, have been growing so rapidly that we really have too small a space now to meet the needs of this large and growing population,” Executive Director Stephen Bero said.
The Ella Johnson board spent years looking for a centrally located, single lot to build one large library. But those plans “never really came up with anything workable,” Bero said.
Instead, officials are taking a page from the Cook Memorial Library District up in Lake County and the Oswego Public Library District. Both have library campuses in each of their major municipalities.
Similarly, the Ella Johnson district has proposed new twin libraries — each about 20,000 square feet — one in Hampshire and the other in Pingree Grove. If voters agree, the district would borrow $30 million by issuing bonds to fund the building project.
“So this still meets that need of sufficient space. It meets the need of convenient access,” Bero said.
Officials estimate that library taxes would be approximately double what they are now, according to a district FAQ. The typical homeowner in the district pays roughly $120 per year in library taxes. If voters approve the funding request, that homeowner would pay $240 per year in library taxes.
“I think there’s a lot of pent-up energy about the library. People are excited to … finally get those new services that they’ve been asking for all these years,” Bero said. “Yes, it’s going to cost, but we feel the cost is reasonable.”
Pingree Grove has donated land to the district between the current municipal center and a community garden on Reinking Road.
The library district is also eyeing a portion of a future Hampshire municipal campus being planned north of downtown on State Street.
The village is building a new public works garage. A combination village hall and police department is “in our plan, but probably 10 years down the road,” Hampshire Village Manager Jay Hedges said.
“We had the architectural firm who’s doing our public works garage give us a … site plan to see if we could put the library on our municipal campus as well. And it fits very nicely there,” Hedges said.
The existing library building in Hampshire could be converted to a restaurant or any kind of business, Hedges said, but it could also be used as a temporary facility for village board meetings.
“We want to pursue those options and look at what the possibilities are,” Hedges said.
Meanwhile, the village has authorized a special census to be conducted this spring because “we think we’ve grown probably about” 3,000 to 4,000 people since the 2020 count, Hedges said.
Bero said it’s “past time that the library expand.”
The election is Nov. 5.