NORTH HAMPTON Unless things change in a day or two, Town Meeting voters will face two warrant questions in March seeking approval for a new or expanded North Hampton Library.

A 60% approval is needed for either article, and like most competing proposals, the devil is in the details.

After spending $130,000 over three years of listening, researching upgrades, planning, designing and redesigning, the Library Board of Trustees is seeking to rehabilitate the current library and expand its footprint by half to 10,500 square feet.

The entire cost to bring forth the trustees' vision is $3,354,000, which includes interior equipment and furniture, system and technological upgrades, and a community meeting room. With $780,000 from the Library Capital Reserve Fund and another $300,000 in contributions, the trustees' petition article requests permission to bond for $2,274,000.

The competing warrant article to build a brand new library comes from Selectmen Jim Maggiore and Larry Miller, after about six months of planning and $19,000 for design, surveys, and bid documents. Select Board member Kathleen Kilgore, also a library trustee, recused herself from the selectmens proposal since her home abuts where the library would be built: the Homestead lot.

Miller chose the architect to design the 10,500-square-foot new library with similar space inclusion as the trustees plan. He chose three construction firms to offer bids. Maggiore and Miller chose the lowest bid of the three: $2,723,907.

With $100,000 in promised donations including Millers and $348,907 from the towns unassigned fund balance (reserves), the selectmens warrant question requests permission to bond for $2,275,000. The amount is exactly $1,000 more than the trustees proposal so the selectmen's article could be placed before the trustees article on the warrant.

Although the dollar requests are basically the same, the selectmens proposal builds a library building shell, without the interior accouterments and upgrades included in the trustees plan, according to resident Frank Ferraro.

At the Jan. 13 meeting, Ferraro challenged the selectmen after analyzing the bid document. He said there were no accommodations for new furniture and equipment, upgraded and new technology like staff and patron computers, card catalogs or moving costs. Millers answer was that the trustees have $780,000 in the Library Capital Reserve Fund with which to buy those things, indicating the true cost of the selectmen's plan is more than the amount requested for a functioning library.

But, Maggiores and Millers project has one very significant plus going for it. It would build a new library on the Homestead lot, a longed-for dream of many.

That exact proposal was nixed by both selectmen years ago, said resident Paul Marquis, who asked Miller why using the Homestead lot for the library this time is palatable? Miller said since voters turned down the municipal complex plan three times, he now believes building a new library on the Homestead lot is the only possibility.

The selectmens proposal also offers another advantage, according to Miller and Maggiore: Its a first step in easing the towns space and building insufficiencies.

Building a new library would vacate space in the current library, Miller said. The town's administrative offices could move there, he said, vacating the second floor of the police station, into which the Police Department could move to remedy its space needs. As a result, Miller believes the selectmens proposal saves $1.5 million because the town wont have to build new space for town administrative offices.

However, there are no monetary requests to renovate the current library for town administrative use or to renovate the police station.

In the Bauen Corporations Municipal Complex Cost Study from 2015, based on square footage renovation costs, the Chauncey plan estimated it would take $890,000 to renovate the current library for town administrative use. Further, estimates for police station renovations were hundreds of thousands of dollars more.

Library Trustee Chairwoman Susan Leonardi challenges Miller on cost savings. She said with the price of executing the renovations to the library and police station, there would be few if any savings, in spite of not building a new administrative building.

Additionally, given that state law gives library trustees complete authority over all library dealings and buildings, there is the outstanding question of whether the Select Board has the authority to build a library. No matter what happens at the polls, taxpayers may end up paying legal fees so the court can decide who has the authority to build the library.

At the beginning of the Jan. 13 meeting, Maggiore took a moment to explain to residents that the selectmens library alternative is an endeavor to give voters a choice between two library proposals.

This is not an attempt to divide our community, he said.

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Dueling library projects on the ballot in North Hampton - Seacoastonline.com