Letter: Finance Committee Is Obligated to Provide Residents with an Up-To-Date Fiscal Analysis of Jones Project

The following letter was sent to the Amherst Finance Committee on November 21, 2024.

I am writing (again) about the crossroads we are at with the controversial demolition and expansion of the Jones Library.

I love a good library, even more, a great library. I’d be happy for the Jones Library to take care of many years of deferred maintenance, and aim to become great in its current footprint, which is already larger than several of my favorite great libraries, and through repairs and reconfiguration, be all that it could be.

For these reasons and many more you are familiar with, I join many in Amherst who want the library expansion project to be declared insolvent and the town to change course to fix the HVAC, elevator, and atrium, and relieve Amherst’s taxpayers from a huge burden, and start work on a new fire station, public works headquarters, road repair, and elementary school.

How the library got first in line is a mystery to me. It seems to involve sharp elbows and a low-information public. And bending certain realities, like describing the 3000 yes votes of 5000 voters a decisive mandate.

Not to mention:

• Few of those 3000 yes votes have contributed much to the $7,000,000 fundraising goal
• We may be about to lose $2,000,000 because we didn’t comply with the historic preservation process for an iconic public building on the National Register of Historic Places
• It seems clearer and clearer that the town and taxpayers will get stuck with a much larger obligation than promised
• No council or committee has been real or honest enough to declare that the horse is dead, so we continue to have a decomposing beast to deal with

I am calling on the town’s Finance Committee to protecting economic interests and health of our community. For all the many reasons that have been continuously given, the library project needs an updated objective analysis. My money is on all signs point to no.

Ira Bryck

Ira Bryck has lived in Amherst since 1993, ran the Family Business Center for 25 years, hosted the “Western Mass. Business Show” on WHMP for seven years, now coaches business leaders, and is a big fan of Amherst’s downtown.