Orleans Misses Out On Library Grant

ORLEANS – A state grant from the Massachusetts Board of Library Commissioners that would have covered a significant portion of the cost of building a new Snow Library will not be awarded to the town.

 Members of the Snow Library board of trustees learned Jan. 7 that their grant application, which was submitted for consideration in May, was not accepted for funding. 

 “It was a brief phone call to our director Tavi (Prugno),” said trustees chair Jamie Balliett. He said that the town received a low score on the “economic analysis” portion of its review.

 During the select board’s Jan. 8 meeting, member Kevin Galligan was more pointed in his comments. 

 “The community was viewed and scored as an affluent community,” he said.

 Galligan said the town’s application was otherwise looked upon favorably in a number of other areas, including design, need and support in the community.

 “It’s from the governor’s office,” Balliett said of the grant. “And they’re very, very big right now in making sure that investments are being made in communities that haven’t necessarily gotten investments in the past.”

 The current Snow Library was built in 1952 and was last renovated in 1992. But the library’s needs have outgrown the building, which has also been plagued by structural issues in recent years.

 “We need a library that has enough parking so that people don’t turn away when they pull into the lot,” Balliett said. “We need a library that doesn’t leak. Our roof has leaked 12 times in five years.”

 Working with Oudens Ello Architecture of Boston, the trustees see the opportunity for building a new 24,000-square-foot library at its current 67 Main St. location. A new library would provide more parking and additional space for meetings and other forms of community programming. 

But without the grant, trustees will need to find other ways of financing the cost of the project’s design and construction. Balliett said that will involve private fundraising and also a request for funding at a future town meeting.

 Balliett said the trustees plan to prepare an article for May’s annual town meeting seeking design money. The most current estimates put the cost of design at approximately $4.1 million.

With that money in hand, he said, a capital fundraising team composed of two trustees, two members of the Friends of Snow Library (the library’s nonprofit fundraising group) and a member of the community will be able to begin raising money for the project.

 “There’s already a small amount of money that’s set aside toward this project,” Balliett said. “But I think that having not gotten the grant, more emphasis will be placed on the ability to raise an increasing amount privately.”

 The request for design funds would be followed in May 2026 for another ask to fund construction of a new library, which is expected to cost approximately $41.7 million. The grant, if awarded, could have covered close to half of that cost.

 Trustees and other library advocates have made a strong push for a new library in recent years. Town meeting voters approved funding or studies related to the effort in 2023 and 2024, while public forums have been held to educate the public about what a new library would mean for the community.

 “We’ve had strong backing from the public to move ahead, and we feel that this is a priority for many people living in the town of Orleans,” said Balliett, noting that 77,000 people visited the library last year. “Snow Library’s not just a library. It’s a cultural center. It’s a community center. It’s a place for people to gather and interact with each other.”

 But there’s also a recognition by trustees that plans for a new library need to fit in with other important town priorities. The town is also studying the possibility of creating a town campus on Eldredge Park Way that could site both a new fire station and a new or renovated Orleans Elementary School.

 With multiple projects being considered, Balliett said plans for a library need to work alongside those other needs without competing with them.

 “We know that it’s a focus of the community,” he said. “It’s just a question of how to balance that out with other very important projects going on.”

 But while balancing the town’s many infrastructure needs is important, Balliett said the case still needs to continue to be made for a new library, which Balliett called a “once in a lifetime project.”

 “Orleans is an exciting place to be living in right now,” he said. “We’re making a lot of the right decisions in terms of the types of projects that make a difference. Water quality makes a difference. An appropriate and new police station made a difference. A better public works facility really made a difference. And we feel that a new library is right there. And despite the difficult news that we didn’t get the state grant, we feel that moving ahead makes sense.”