Picture an updated, fully insulated and larger Dr. Shaw Memorial Library, one that keeps all the New England farmhouse charm and provides enough room to host programs for more than a dozen people at a time, and one that is accessible to all.
Then move on to a larger rescue station nearby, one without the stairs blocking the middle of the bays, and one that can house the Mount Vernon Fire Department’s antique truck as well as a newer firetruck.
Key numbers for Dr. Shaw Memorial Library in Mount Vernon:
• 3,912 library visits in 2014;
• 12,000 print materials available plus downloadable eBooks through the Maine State Library
• 1,637 video units
• 24 journal subscriptions
• Total circulation 10,742 items in 2014
• 768 registered users
• 349 people used the six computers available to the public
• 335 hours of volunteer service, most of that performed by five people
Source: Alice Olson, head librarian
A special town meeting about both those projects is scheduled for 7 p.m. Monday at the Mount Vernon Town Hall.
The meeting agenda asks whether voters will approve the library expansion project and authorize selectmen and library trustees to accept and spend private donations for it.
It also asks whether the town will authorize the rescue station expansion, which would be funded by private money that already has been raised.
Neither project will require taxpayer money at this point, according to Paul Crockett, chairman of the Board of Selectmen, although he anticipated that the town would be supporting the upkeep of the library at least.
He said the two items were not ready in time for the warrant for the annual Town Meeting, which was held June 13.
“We are dealing with private funding for the expansion of our rescue station and our library and want to be careful about the process in taking in the funding and allowing for the expenditures,” Crockett said. “We’re accepting private money for public buildings. We want the public to know what we’re doing since we’re accepting contributions. We want to be as transparent as possible.”
The library project is particularly ambitious. The library had an operating budget of $30,500 for the most recent calendar year.
Vienna residents in March approved spending $3,500 for the library, and on June 13 Mount Vernon residents contributed $23,500.
The library’s board of trustees has embarked on a plan to raise $400,000, with the construction to begin in late summer or early fall of 2016.
A progress report by George Smith, who serves on the board and is heading the fundraising efforts, says $100,000 has been collected already. An invitation-only gala is one of the events planned for later this summer, and corporate donations will be sought. The library trustees have been working on the project for a year already.
In his will, Dr. Herbert Shaw, who died in 1939, left his house and his savings to be used for a library, and it opened in 1943, becoming the town library in 1979, according to information posted on the library’s website.
It serves the towns of Mount Vernon and Vienna and is open Mondays, Wednesdays and Saturdays.
“It’s really open to everybody,” said Alice Olson, head librarian.
Plans call for the library building to be enlarged, with part of an old section of the ell being removed and replaced by a 1,100-square-foot structure on a slab.
“We’re hoping to have additional space for books,” Olson said. “A key hope to is to increase our volumes and to increase our meeting space to have room for programs.”
Currently, she said, no more than a dozen people can assemble in a given area, and furniture has to be moved.
For the children’s programs, for instance, Olson said, “We just shove the table into the corner and squish ourselves in.”
Olson noted that the library patron numbers balloon in the summer.
Last Saturday about 30 people visited; during July and August, patron numbers run double or triple that.
“It’s incredible in the summer,” Olson said.
Library trustee Fred Webber, who has been on the board for more than 30 years, said the $400,000 would allow significant work to be done on the existing library, including new windows and a new roof as well as adding more insulation.
“With that sum of money, we’d be the fanciest small library around,” Webber said, adding that a minimum of $300,000 would allow the expansion to move forward. Donations to the library are tax-deductible, Webber said.
The trustees have worked with architects at Bunker & Savage in Augusta and now have some completed drawings.
Webber anticipated an informational meeting offering more details about the library project later this summer.
Mount Vernon Fire Chief Dana Dunn said the effort to put an addition on the rear of the substation went to the Planning Board last week and now has a permit to proceed.
The 14-foot-by-26-foot addition will house a set of stairs as well as the department’s 1934 antique firetruck.
Construction began Wednesday, and the new space will allow the department to move another truck to that substation, making room for a new truck, the purchase of which is anticipated in about a year.
The expansion project, estimated at $7,000 to $10,000, is fully funded already by money raised by the Mount Vernon Fire Company, a private entity separate from the Mount Vernon Fire Department.
The department has 22 volunteer firefighters, all of whom belong to the fire company, Dunn said.
Betty Adams — 621-5631
Twitter: @betadams
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