Reversal in Madison: Plan for New Central Library Dropped
Cost impasse with developer points city back to renovating existing library
Norman Oder -- Library Journal, 03/22/2010
- Library was to cost $37 million
- $2.1 million gap in assessment of value
- Renovation could cost $27 million
Last November, LJ reported that the city of Madison, WI, was moving ahead on a $37 million new Central Library for the Madison Public Library. Mayor Dave Cieslewicz explained on his blog that competitive construction bids and low interest rates made the project a good deal.
However, the library plan, part of a larger real estate project proposed by the Fiore Companies and Irgens Development Partners, has since collapsed, and Cieslewicz is now pushing a major renovation.
The problem: a $2.1 million difference in costs, according to the State Journal. After the city and the developers reached an impasse over the cost of the core and exterior of the building, the city offered $5.1 million for the site, but the developers wanted $7.2 million.
"There is no bad guy in this story," the mayor explained on his blog. "[Fiore's] Bill Kunkler and his team negotiated in good faith and tried hard to make it work, and so did we. But it was a complex proposal from the start with lots of moving parts. In the end, we just couldn't reach agreement."
Renovation coming
"We believe we can do it at a lower cost and roughly on the same timeline," Cieslewicz said of the renovation.(The newspaper put the cost at $27 million.) "We will need to count on less private fundraising in a tight environment for philanthropy. And because we'll use the existing superstructure of the building, we are essentially recycling it. The greenest building is the one you rebuild."
He dismissed the option of looking for another site, calling it "too time consuming, difficult and costly."
