Posted June 2, 2003.

Philadelphia Considers Selling Free Library Building to Raise Capital

The Philadelphia city council’s finance committee weighed a mayoral proposal May 27 to raise $60 million, half of which would go toward a $120-million renovation of the Free Library of Philadelphia’s main library, by selling the building to a private group of investors. The plan entails leasing FLP’s main library back for no more than $5.5 million annually over 20 years, after which the investors could either give the facility back or buy it permanently for $78 million.

The proposal comes two-and-one-half years after library President and Director Elliot Shelkrot presented council with a capital-improvement request for the headquarters building. He characterized the lease-back idea as “a creative way” to narrow the project’s funding gap, but “not so creative that it has not been done elsewhere.”

“Somebody described it once as the home-equity loan for cities,” testified Richard Gross of BW Realty Advisers, the firm retained by Mayor John F. Street’s administration to identify investors.

However, council member Michael A. Nutter expressed skepticism. Conceding that “the library needs the money,” Nutter noted that the city “didn’t sell anything to finance the stadiums or any host of other things that we wanted to do,” according to the May 28 Philadelphia Inquirer. The proposal has been slated for reconsideration on June 2.

In November, officials at the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh overcame similar opposition over an agreement to lease all 18 city-owned branches in a fundraising scheme to raise refurbishment capital.

Posted June 2, 2003.