The title to Poplar Bluff’s historic library property on Main Street will change hands following a 4-2 vote Monday by city council members.
Ownership will go from the taxpayers of the city of Poplar Bluff... to the taxpayers of the Poplar Bluff library district.
In essence, the only transfer that will occur following a $200,000 payment by the Poplar Bluff Municipal Library District is the matter of who can use the property as collateral for future capital projects, officials from both sides have said.
While the title was held by the city, it could be and was used by the city to provide surety for loans that funded projects such as the Black River Coliseum construction, renovations on the library property itself, and improvements to the city’s golf course.
The transfer of title to the library district will now mean the Board of Trustees can use the property as collateral for any future projects the district undertakes.
Attorneys for both sides will meet now to determine when the property will formally be turned over to the library district, said city manager Matt Winters said after Monday’s council meeting.
“The trustees of the library are very pleased with the council’s decision,” said John Stanard, president of the Board of Trustees. “Nothing is changing at the library. It simply will allow the library to provide more and better services.”
The vote by council members is expected to end a court case brought in 2018 by the Poplar Bluff Municipal Library District Board of Trustees. The case was raised after the board’s request for title to the property was turned down by a previous council.
The measure Monday was supported by Mayor pro tem Steve Davis and council members Shane Cornman, Barbara Horton and Lisa Parson.
Mayor Robert Smith and council member Ed DeGaris voted against the decision. Council member Chris Taylor was absent.
The Board of Trustees met Monday afternoon and agreed to make a lump sum payment in return for the property, assistant library director Shannon Midyett said before the vote. Council members had said they would accept two payments of $100,000 each.
Horton said she supported the transfer because the board has taken such good care of the property.
Smith and DeGaris both said they had received questions from the public about the council’s decision to “give away” the property.
“I cannot explain to them why the citizens paid sales tax over 100 years for a building, and then just give it away, a building that’s probably worth more than $2 million,” DeGaris said. “I just can’t explain to anybody why that’s the best thing for the citizens. I read in the paper about it going to court and the summary judgment’s coming before long. This is superseding what the courts are going to say.”
Smith agreed, saying he had been told the city shouldn’t sell the property.
Parson, who originally made the motion to accept the $200,000 payment, said previously she supported the measure because of the history of how the library and property have been paid for.
Grant money, private donations and a property tax have supported the library operations, renovations and expansions since 1917.
“Right now, the library is what’s known as a municipal library district under state law. That means it is an autonomous political subdivision, operating under the state of Missouri,” Midyett explained at a council meeting in March. “In the 30s, the library didn’t have that kind of authority under the state law. And I feel like, at that time, that’s the reason why the original structure was originally deeded to the city of Poplar Bluff rather than to the library.”
Library officials have also said they paid almost $500,000 to the city following a “gentleman’s agreement” to transfer the title.
The 2014 memorandum of understanding set five-year payments from the library district to the city in return for money that supplemented the district between 2008-2012, according to the document.
Council members at the end of the five years declined to transfer the property to the district, saying it might be needed for collateral for future capital projects.
“(We) think that most of the structure as it stands today was actually paid for, it can be traced back to the library property tax, the library sales tax, and then have it all proven some money dedicated by the voters to the library, and private donations,” Midyett said in March.
In 1935, with an FDR grant, voters passed a bond, at the library’s request, for the purchasing of land and construction of a library, Davis said. “Since that time, it has been library property and sales tax, grants and donations to the library that have almost exclusively been used to maintain and renovate the library,” he said. “Tonight’s vote was long overdue; it gave the citizens’ library what the citizens’ taxes have paid for. This was about respecting the will of the people all the way back to 1935, to give the library its building, what the citizens wanted and want.”