The Kanawha County Public Library system's board spent about two hours in closed session Monday regarding what the meeting agenda called a "Summary Presentation of Main Library Project and Options."
In a voice vote with no nays heard, the board approved going into the closed session, after board President Monika Jaensson cited an exemption to state open meetings law for "matters involving or affecting the purchase, sale or lease of property, which, if made public, might adversely affect the financial or other interests," of the library system.
In February, the board approved a contract laying out an expected four- to six-month process to prepare the board to ultimately choose either to overhaul its existing main branch location or pick a specific new site.
The current main branch building is on the corner of Capitol and Quarrier streets in downtown Charleston.
Jody Driggs, with Charleston-based Silling Associates, said then his firm and HBM Architects of Cleveland will help narrow a list of 16 to 18 possible locations to no more than six options that will be presented to the board.
Board members then will choose three possible locations or existing buildings for the consultants to do deeper, graphic "Test Fit" studies on.
"We'll actually get in and start doing some kind of graphic design analysis of how the property might function if it was a new building, or how an existing building might be renovated and how it might perform as a library," Driggs said.
He said his team then would develop cost estimates for the top three, so the board can make an informed final location decision.
He said the current list of locations was developed by Brooks McCabe, a real estate broker with Charleston-based West Virginia Commercial, who currently serves on the state Public Service Commission.
Both McCabe and Driggs were in Monday's closed session, but McCabe declined comment afterward.
"The analysis of potential site opportunities has just moved a little slower than maybe we would have envisioned," Driggs said Monday. "So that's probably our mistake on the estimation of time, that kind of thing is just really hard to predict."
But he said the system seems very pleased with where they are.
System Director Alan Engelbert said Monday the main branch locations have basically been pared down to three, with a renovation of the current branch one of the remaining three.
Cheryl Crigger Morgan, head of the library's ad hoc building projects committee, said her committee felt it was time to present an overview of work completed to date on the new library project. She said no decisions had been made.
Reach Ryan Quinn at
304-348-1254 or follow
@RyanEQuinn on Twitter.