FAYETTEVILLE -- Voters will not know which way the Fayetteville Public Library will expand when they head to the polls Aug. 9.
The Arkansas Supreme Court agreed to review the potential sale of the former City Hospital land from Washington Regional Medical Center to the library.
The lawsuit
Stephen and Amanda Stone gave the land south of where the library sits now to Fayetteville in 1906, stipulating it be used as a city hospital, which it was for several decades. Washington Regional started leasing the land from the City Hospital organization in the 1990s and was named City Hospital’s successor in 2011.
The city traded the land to Washington Regional for 1 acre near the medical center for a roundabout. The Stone heirs brought their objections to court when Washington Regional sued to clear the land’s title for sale.
Source: Staff Report
The $2 million sale has been on hold since heirs of the Stone family, who donated the land to the city a century ago, began fighting it in court. Circuit and appeals court judges have ruled in favor of the land sale. The case made it to the state Supreme Court's docket, and on Thursday, the petition for review was granted.
The court's decision likely means months of filings and hearings, meaning a decision won't be made by the Aug. 9 special election. Voters will decide if they want to raise the library's 1-mill property tax to 3.7 mills in order to pay for an expansion.
The millage increase would cost taxpayers an extra $54 per year for an assessed $100,000 of property owned. The levy eventually would settle at 2.5 mills once construction bonds are paid off.
The library's board's preferred plan would nearly double the library's size, adding about 80,000 square feet that would extend south to the old City Hospital land. Prominent features include a two-story children's area, a roof garden, genealogy area and additional parking.
If the Supreme Court rules the hospital can't sell the land but the millage increase is approved, the expansion would go upward and splay out onto the existing footprint. The building could have two additional floors and would entail closing part of Rock Street.
Either way, the need to expand remains, said David Johnson, the library's executive director.
"We welcome the court's review and we want all sides to feel that they've been heard about the issue, but the simple fact is that people are loving the library to death, and we're going to have to press forward," he said.
Jeffrey Scherer is the library's original architect and his firm is heading the expansion project. The building was designed to be able to withstand additional floors, but that type of construction would present a few challenges, Johnson said. Finding a way to add parking would be more difficult and there would be a disruption of services while construction is going on if the expansion is limited to the existing footprint, Johnson said.
"It just presents a whole new set of challenges," he said. "Fortunately, the architect firm that we have, they've encountered just about everything you can imagine. We're sure that they'll give us good advice and our Board of Trustees will make good decisions."
The price of the two expansion plans differ, but the cost to taxpayers would not change, Johnson said, adding it would just be a matter of adjusting how much they need to seek in private donations.
Jane Lipscomb Stone, who has represented the Stone family throughout the proceedings, said the Supreme Court's decision acknowledges important issues regarding the fate of charitable gifts once the donors are no longer living and can't watch over their gift .
"We are hopeful that the truth of the underlying transactions which resulted in Washington Regional Medical Center's position that they own the City Hospital land will come to light during this process," she said. "WRMC sued Amanda and Stephen Stones' heirs, and should not have been surprised that the heirs investigated the transactions and elected to defend against the lawsuit, or that the family would do everything possible to protect the charitable intent of the gift to the city of Fayetteville."
Thomas Olmstead, senior vice president and general counsel for Washington Regional, expressed disappointment the legal proceedings for the former City Hospital property haven't concluded.
"We are confident that the Arkansas Supreme Court, upon concluding its review, will come to the same conclusion as the Washington County Circuit Court and two separate panels of the Arkansas Court of Appeals -- that Washington Regional Medical Center is the lawful and exclusive owner of the city hospital property," he said.
No matter what the decision is, Johnson said the library is bursting at the seams. The board has raised fees, frozen salaries and trimmed about $300,000 in maintenance, material and programs in the past two years in order to make the most of its budget, he said.
The library averages 185 patrons per hour, issuance of library cards have tripled in the past 15 years and children have been turned away from programs because of a lack of space, Johnson said.
"Those pressures are still there," he said. "The City Hospital makes it a very convenient solution to expansion, but this community's up to the challenge of building vertical if that's what we need to do."
NW News on 07/22/2016