MISSION VIEJO : City Making Plans for New Library

There are times when silence is not golden in a library.

Picture 45 preschoolers tramping through the library on their way to a storytelling session featuring Robby the Happy Clown. Or consider an adult lecture series such as one held in an area library recently, entitled “How to Catch a Man--Sure You Can!”

Today’s library can be much more to a community than a dusty repository for books enveloped in mausoleum-like quiet. And that unfulfilled potential has frustrated the staff of the Mission Viejo Public Library.

Built in 1971 when the community had fewer than 12,000 residents, the library was suffering through growing pains a decade ago.

Today, the city is home to 73,000 people, yet the library remains the same size. There is barely enough room in the building to hold books, much less stage community events, say Mission Viejo librarians.

Quotas must be set for special children’s events, and children are sometimes turned away because space is limited.

After school, when the library is the most crowded, patrons are sometimes found sitting on the floor. Only about 20 parking spaces are available, and vehicles must either circle around the library indefinitely or park several hundred yards away in the nearest public lot.

“Staff morale is really down,” said head librarian Mary Ann Hutton. “There’s a sense of never being able to catch up.”

But it’s only a matter of time before cramped quarters are a thing of the past.

For several months a library committee has been looking at potential sites for a new library. This week, the committee is expected to recommend a 4.5-acre site off La Paz Road near Marguerite Parkway to the City Council.

The opportunity to build a new library, a joint venture between the county library system and Mission Viejo, has excited city and library officials.

“This has been a dream and a labor of love since 1986 for me,” said Councilman Robert D. Breton, “and now I can see we’re coming close to fruition.”

The city has tentative plans to construct a 25,000-square-foot building--almost triple the size of the current 9,000-square-foot facility on Chrisanta Drive.

The cost of the new library building is estimated at $3 million to $6 million.

“We’ll have special children’s areas and reading rooms,” Breton said, “special areas for arts displays, places for lectures, debates and groups to meet. This will be a cultural center, a place for learning and a place of adventure for everybody.”

Under an agreement with the county, the city will pay for the land, which is currently owned by the Mission Viejo Co. Negotiations with the company have not begun.

The county is responsible for the building construction and will sell the current library building, worth about $1 million.

The city and county hope to draw state and federal grants to pay for the balance of construction costs.

“If everything goes well, we could break ground next year and open the library in 1994,” Breton said.

Currently, the library is among the four busiest in the county system. When the new library opens, it will probably be the top facility in the system in terms of books in circulation, Hutton said.

“I can see the new building being a regional library,” Hutton said. “We have a very upwardly mobile, very educated community here. This new library is something they deserve.”