After two years of formal planning and design work, the E.C. Scranton Memorial Library is ready to put the ceremonial construction shovel in the ground. The Library Board of Trustees will hold a formal public groundbreaking on Monday, March 25 at 4 p.m. at the construction site downtown.

“To officially kick-off construction, the board of trustees and library staff invite all Madison residents and businesses to share in the official groundbreaking ceremony on March 25 at 4 p.m. at 801 Boston Post Road,” said Library Board of Trustees President Beth Coyne. “Please join the library board, town and state officials, and the Chamber of Commerce as we put a shovel in the ground to symbolize fulfillment of our promise to provide a new and improved library and community space for Madison.”

At the groundbreaking, the trustees will announce the latest fundraising initiative; The Golden Shovel Society, a group of donors recognized for giving $1,000 or more. This is the last new fundraising initiative is designed to help close the $600,000 fundraising gap for the library to hit its $6 million.

The E.C. Scranton Memorial Library renovation process officially started in 2017, when voters approved bonding $9 million for the project and the library pledged to raise $6 million to cover the remaining project costs.

In 2018, the Library Building Committee went through a series of building design changes and funding scares. By far one of the largest challenges the Library Building Committee encountered came up in summer 2018 after the State Historic Preservation Office (SHPO) threatened to withhold a large part of the renovation project funding over preservation of the Hull Building. The issue took time to resolve, but the committee and SHPO were eventually able to come to terms, sparing the project any more funding challenges or timeline issues.

With all approvals in place, the committee put the project out to bid; the winning bid, $9,847,952 (less than the roughly $11 million construction threshold for the project), was by Enterprise Builders. The contractor was on site and starting work shortly after the New Year.

On March 5, the Hull Building on the site was officially demolished. The old post office, also known as the white building, on the property has been shifted and turned and will soon be set in its final position.

When the building cost estimate first came in below budget, there was some public confusion on the need for the library to keep fundraising. However, initial construction costs may have come in under budget, but the library intends to revise the plan to spend $15 million to build the library because of the way some of the project grant money works. The way the $2 million in state grants are structured, if the total project comes in under budget, the state gets to take back money first, so essentially, if the project were to come in at $14 million instead of $15 million, the cost to Madison would remain the same.

Library Board of Trustees President Beth Coyne previously said that fact is another reason why the library is looking at bringing back some deferred maintenance projects like repairs to the existing roof, repointing the masonry on the historical portion of the building, and rethinking the financing on the photovoltaic (PV) panels for the roof.

“I think we should keep that grant money in Madison, in my opinion,” she said previously. “We are on budget and we want to give everyone the best library possible for the money we said we are going to spend.”

Because the total project won’t come in under budget, Coyne said the library needs to keep up fundraising. The library board of trustees put up part of the library trusts for collateral but hopes to fundraise enough so that the trusts do not need to be touched. The trusts produce interest and that interest is used to support the library operating budget, so if the principal of the trust is depleted, so is the interest payment.

“If we have to dip in, it hurts the library long term, so we are trying not to do that,” said Coyne. “Our pledge as a board was to continue fundraising until we have the full $6 million.”

The formal groundbreaking is Monday, March 25 at 4 p.m. at the E.C. Scranton Library, 801 Boston Post Road. For more information, visit scrantonlibrary.org or call 203-245-7365.