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Capital Campaign

Each year, the Library Trustees owe approximately $60,000 from the Building Gift Fund to the Town General Fund as repayment on monies the Town Meeting approved as local share of the costs of rebuilding and converting our building into the Library. The Trustees’ promise to repay the $770,000 bridge loan and the need to raise $100,000 more to complete the exterior of the Library highlight the fundraising effort the Library Trustees, Staff and volunteers still have ahead of them.

The Board of Library Trustees are comprised of many new Trustees who were not directly part of that historic Town Meeting vote. As the Trustees educate themselves on the Library’s finances, the Trustees wanted to provide the Library community with an historical perspective on the fundraising efforts.Special Town Meeting (STM Article 11, 2001) raised and appropriated $1,050,000 on the strength of a commitment from the Library Trustees to raise $1,072,000 privately to match the Town’s contribution. Fundraising started slowly, and the Trustees returned to the Annual Town Meeting requesting a bridge loan of $770,000 to add to the $302,000 already raised to make up the total $1,072,000 match. So, when the entire $1,820,000 (the Town share of $1,050,000 and the Trustees remaining debt of $770,000 on their match) went out for permanent bonding in September 2005, the Trustees were left with a resulting $770,000 debt to the Town. Going forward, the Library’s indebtedness is expressed as 42.31% of the entire bond amount ($1,820,000) and interest on this $770,000 is calculated at 3.7%. A twenty-year bond repayment schedule for the Library’s 42.31% share has been created and the first payment was $84,831. Subsequent payments will be of lesser amounts as the principal is reduced, but the Library still has a twenty-year mortgage payment that will be paid through continued fundraising efforts. As Library Trustee Edward “Mick” Rudd explains, “Fundraising is a perennial responsibility of the Trustees for the next twenty years, at the very least to make annual loan repayments but additionally to fund any further projects the Trustees and the Town decide to undertake to restore the building.”Below is a summary of the more than $3 million raised since 2001 that has been expended to renovate 356 Commercial Street and convert it into our State of the Art Library. The $3 million represents an investment in our cultural institution for years to come.

Library Construction Grant $1,878,456
Private Contributions to Building Funds $1,462,656

TOTAL RAISED 4-1-2008 $3,341,112

Mon & Fri 10-5

Sat 10-2

Tues & Thurs Noon-8

Sunday 1-5

Wed 10-8