MISSION VIEJO : Council May Back Off Full Library Funding

Reversing its earlier position, the city staff on Monday will recommend to the City Council that $6 million allocated in the proposed 1995-96 budget for library construction be reduced.

Including the full amount of construction costs, staff members said, could hurt the city’s chances of getting grants or issuing bonds for the library.

Sherri M. Butterfield, the library’s main advocate on the council, said she understands the logic of staff’s position--with one provision.

“I want the budget to cover whatever we actually have to spend for fiscal 1995-96,” Butterfield said.

“I have gone on record saying I wouldn’t vote for a budget that doesn’t have a library item,” she said, but “it doesn’t have to have the full $6 million.”

The council had agreed last month that the budget would include full funding for the proposed 25,000-square-foot library.

Councilman Lawrence H. Smith, who has pushed the city to move slowly and carefully on the issue, supports the city staff’s latest recommendation.

“I’d like to see the allocation reduced but enough money put in to complete the planning phase,” Smith said. “My view is that we make about a $1.5-million commitment to get that part of the work done.”

Butterfield said she is still fully committed to speeding up the library project, which has been in the planning phase for three years.

“Getting this library built is the goal,” she said. “I’m not willing to sit around another two years.”