Plans for a new library on Metropolitan State University’s St. Paul, Minnesota, campus call for the facility to contain a branch of the St. Paul Public Library. The university has raised more than $2.3 million for the project from private sources and is requesting $16.7 million from the Minnesota legislature.
To be called the Metropolitan State University Community Library and Information Access Center, the 76,116-square-foot facility will offer computers and electrical ports for laptops at 229 of its 262 seats. SPPL will staff and support its portion of the facility, offering young adult and children’s areas. The joint facility is expected to be open 94 hours a week—more than any other public library in the area.
“The library’s design is uniquely cost effective,” Metropolitan State’s Development Director Nancy McKillips said in a January 11 press release. MSU Library Services Director Jeff Jackson noted that the facility “will be the first of its kind in Minnesota.” If funded, the library is slated to open in 2001.
Posted January 17, 2000.