A $150,000 anonymous donation has breathed new life into a longtime dream of constructing a new home for the Whitewright Public Library.
Mayor Sarah Beth Owen said the donation, made by an anonymous family earlier this year, was given with the intention of helping the city develop a new library building.
Since then, city leaders have begun exploring how the gift could serve as seed money for a larger project.
“It was a very generous donation,” Owen said.
The proposed site is across the street from Whitewright City Hall, on property adjacent to Legend Bank.
The city already owns a portion of the land needed for the project and is negotiating with the bank over the possible donation of an adjoining tract.
Owen said discussions between the city and bank are ongoing, with both sides working to establish terms for a potential land donation.
If an agreement can be reached, the property could accommodate both a new library and additional parking. The parking could also serve Legend Bank and provide overflow parking for other downtown businesses.
The project has received interest from both the Whitewright Community Development and Economic Development Corporations.
Owen said the community development board views a new library as a worthwhile project and has savings that could potentially be contributed toward construction.
The board has also explored the possibility of long-term financing that could be repaid from revenues it receives annually.
The economic development board’s interest centers in part on the additional downtown parking that could be created as part of the project.
The City Council has also expressed support for continuing discussions, although Owen stressed that no money for construction is currently included in the city’s budget.
For now, securing a site is the first hurdle.
The city is not ready to spend money on architectural drawings, engineering studies or detailed construction estimates until officials know where the library will be built.
“The city can’t move any further forward, committing funds to drawings, cost estimates or other planning documents until we know where we’re going to build it,” Owen said.
If an agreement with the bank cannot be reached, Owen said the city owns other property that could be considered for the project.
The idea of building a standalone library is not new in Whitewright. Years ago, an active library board developed plans for a new facility that was envisioned for the same general location. Those plans called for a two-story building.
Owen said there has been interest in revisiting that earlier design but scaling it back to a single-story facility. Any final design, however, would depend on the site ultimately selected.
The Whitewright Public Library currently occupies a portion of City Hall. While its existing space is substantial, Owen said the library serves many patrons from Whitewright and surrounding communities as one of the relatively few brick-and-mortar public libraries in southeast Grayson County.
Its role has also grown far beyond lending books.
The library offers summer programming and activities for children, a computer lab, interlibrary loans and access to digital reading materials.
It also maintains a “library of things,” allowing patrons to check out useful items ranging from baking pans and sewing machines to automotive code readers.
A standalone building would give those services room to grow while freeing space at City Hall for expanded municipal operations. It would also allow city services to remain concentrated in the downtown area.
For now, however, the project remains in its early stages. The anonymous family’s $150,000 contribution provides a significant starting point, but decisions about the site, design, financing and eventual construction remain ahead.
Owen said the immediate focus is reaching an agreement on the land before the city takes the next step toward turning the longtime idea into a construction project.
Source: Freepik.com