Syracuse-Turkey Creek Township Library Executive Director Kim Blaha presents to the Kosciusko County Council Thursday, Sept. 11, about the library’s hopes to build a new building. Photo by David Slone, Times-Union.

By David Slone
Times-Union

WARSAW — With the Syracuse-Turkey Creek Township Library hoping to start a new library building project in early 2026, Executive Director Kim Blaha presented the plans to the Kosciusko County Council Thursday night, Sept. 11.

She was joined by her library board members, Baker Tilly Manager Lisa Huntington and Arkos Design architect Phillip DeAngelis.

“This has been a long-term project,” said Blaha. “When I started in 2015 as director, they were remodeling the library so we got all new paint, carpeting and everything but with no structural changes. It looked really nice, but we still didn’t have that much space.”

Over the next few years, they reconfigured the space they did have to see if they could make better use of it. Nothing worked, she said, so she and the board started talking about maybe putting an addition on to the library.

In 2020, the library bought an adjacent lot with gift funds they had. They then got a feasibility grant from The Dekko Foundation to study expanding the library with an addition. The thorough analysis of the building and all of its systems came up with four possible design options.

“But what we found was, one of the issues with that was that we would have to vacate the alley … between the other property owned and the library where we were going to add on,” Blaha explained.

They went to the Syracuse Town Council to propose the vacation but she said they didn’t get a lot of affirmation for it.

Returning to the feasibility report, she said it showed the whole building would have to be completely renovated to come up to code to even be able to put an addition on.

“We really were very disappointed in the results of it because everyone in town, they have fond memories of the library,” said Blaha. “They grew up there and they remember going to the library, and it’s a beautiful building. It’s a Carnegie Library, but it no longer has historical value because of the additions and the things that they put on over the years.”

The building is 104 years old, and she said there are a number of issues with it besides the space factor. In 2024, the library had 31,200 visits to the library. They circulated almost 90,000 physical materials.

“It’s a heavily used place and there’s always something that needs to be fixed,” she stated.

The feasibility study suggested it would cost between $3 million to $5 million to renovate and add on to the library, which would give them about 5,000 more square feet. It also would take away all of the library outdoor area and parking, and the library would be completely landlocked after that, she told the council.

Thinking that was not a good use of a facility, the board decided to start looking for land and build a new building.

“So we spent almost two years exploring every possible option that we could find, and we found nothing until the town of Syracuse, we found that they had about a two-acre piece of property that was just grass,” said Blaha. “It had not been used and it was just empty. We thought that might be a good place to put it because we wanted people to be able to walk from their houses to it, and that is the way it is now, but we didn’t want to put it in the main area where all the businesses are because you really have to drive there, and we wanted the kids to be able to walk to the library.”

The grassy area is about three blocks from where the library currently is located, on Dolan Drive across from the former Syracuse Elementary School where apartments are now. The library approached the town about the property, and the town donated it to the library last summer, but a library has to be built on it. Another piece of the study with Arkos Design came up with a schematic design process. Over the last year, Blaha said the board worked with Arkos in figuring out what could fit on the property and how big it could be. What they came up with is a library that is a little more than 14,000 square feet on one floor.

“What we wanted when we started out was, we wanted meeting space for the community to use after hours,” said Blaha. “We have no study rooms in the library, and there are people that are counseling their people and tutors and they have to sit in the middle of the library to do it. And we really need something better than that. So we thought, that’s really one of our main things, is to have meeting space that can be used by the community after hours. We have people calling all the time asking for space and we just don’t have it. Our meeting room is busy all the time.”

The property deed has been transferred from the town to the library. A survey was conducted for the property. Two environmental studies were done to assess the property for contaminants, for free through a grant from the Michiana Area Council of Governments (MACOG). Then a geo-survey was done to determine the water table, flood plain and site improvements needed. A feasibility study and schematic design were done. The library has already acquired some of the variances it needed for setbacks. She said they also entered into a contract to purchase two more lots adjacent to the property, contingent upon obtaining a bond.

“We also had the current library assessed to determine the value of it because we plan to sell that. We can’t operate two buildings at all. But we’re hoping that a new library would be much more energy efficient and cost less to maintain it and staff,” Blaha said.

She said they’re not planning to ask for any bond until after the new year. Huntington said Baker Tilly serves as municipal advisors to the library and have been working with the library through the process. She handed out some preliminary financing information to the council members.

“Keep in mind that these financing options are based on preliminary information that we have. As we get closer to the financing, we’ll narrow down the exact number that we need to borrow,” she stated.

The library’s general obligation bonding capacity is based on the net assessed value and any outstanding general obligation debt that the library holds. In this case, Huntington said, the library has no general obligation debts so their GO bonding capacity is about $16 million, which “is a very healthy bonding capacity.” The bonds would be issued in the library’s name and would not impact any debt of the county or the county’s bonding capacity.

She presented two bonding options. At the lower end of the range is financing for about $6.3 million, with a maximum financing term of about 20 years. At 19 years, the maximum payment would be about $725,000, with a tax rate of about 2.98 cents per $100 of assessed valuation.

“These numbers are based on the 2025 net assessed value of the library, so they will, of course, change once the 2026 NAV is released. So subsequent presentations will have those updated numbers for you,” Huntington said, adding the figures are very conservative estimates and using 5% interest rates. Bonds are currently selling at about 4.5%, so Huntington said they expect the numbers to go down a little by the time they go to market.

At the higher end of borrowing, she said they were looking at about $7.3 million for 19 years with a maximum payment of about $795,000 and an estimated tax rate of about 3.27 cents per $100 of assessed valuation. General information was provided to the council on how the tax rate would impact the taxpayer within the library district. For a market-value property of about $173,000, for the 19-year term of the borrowing, it would impact the taxpayer by about $22 at the lower end and about $24 at the higher borrowing amount, she said.

Council President Tony Ciriello said there was a bit of an impact with it. Councilwoman Kimberly Cates said there would be an impact with agricultural property.

“Keep in mind though that now agricultural property, some of the changes with SEA1 does allow for some property tax caps for that. Also, the agricultural property for 2026, the value is just a little bit lower. So, as these adjustments are made, again, these are based on 2025 net assessed values,” Huntington replied.

DeAngelis said there’s a lot of problems with the library’s existing building and the capabilities of it to serve the patrons in the community in the future. After looking at everything within the building, he said the determination was made with the library that the best solution was to build a new building on one single floor. The new building would be about 14,000 square feet, and the property allows for outdoor space activities and on-site parking.

Ciriello said the current library has limited parking space and asked about parking space at the new planned location. DeAngelis said it would more than double their parking space with on-street parking as well as their own dedicated off-site parking lot. The new library also would just be a block away from some additional public parking that could be used when the library has some large events. Blaha closed out the presentation, telling the council she was retiring and the new upcoming director, Jon Gaskill, will be taking over the building project.