COOS BAY — Walking around inside the Coos Bay Public Library, one quickly realizes that the building is on unsteady ground.  

Between the reference desk and two library shelves holding board games, the ceiling leaks. The area is covered with plastic, and a pipe runs from the ceiling to a drain in the floor. 

In the back of the library, in the nonfiction section, the floor slopes up and down and is visibly uneven. Nearby, above individual study desks, large cracks run along the wall. Walk a little farther, and one faces the emergency exit. A large crack runs diagonally above the fire extinguisher and ends at the top left corner of the door frame. Another large crack runs the entire length of the wall where it meets the ceiling.

For years, the Coos Bay Public Library has been sinking into the ground, becoming structurally unstable. 

The public library, like much of downtown, is built on infill. A blue-collar town on Oregon’s central coast, Coos Bay is surrounded by saltwater marsh. In the early and mid-20^th century, the city dumped infill into parts of the bay to expand the downtown core. The foundations of buildings built atop that infill are supported by pilings drilled into the ground. 

The city has long known that the library, built in 1965, is structurally unsound: The pilings supporting its foundation had failed, causing the foundation’s concrete slab to crack, a determination made in a 2014 structural assessment conducted by ZCS Engineering Inc. of Grants Pass. The building would be reliably safe until 2019. Seven years ago.

Since that report, library supporters and the Coos Bay City Council, which oversees the library, have sought to construct a new building for the public library. 

But they have failed to raise the money. The library’s services are enormously popular, but Coos Bay voters have voted “no” twice on bond measures that would have financed construction, most recently in November 2024, when 67 percent of Coos Bay voters turned down the bond. It was a stinging defeat that left city and library leaders unsure of what to do next. 

Time may finally be running out. 

In October, ceiling tiles fell to the floor. That prompted a joint meeting of the City Council and the library’s Board of Trustees, as well as inspections by the city’s building inspector and fire marshal, who reported no immediate safety concerns.

“We’re going to stay in the building as long as we can,” librarian Sami Pierson said. But she admitted, “I have an underlying sense of dread all the time.”

The city has hired ZCS Engineering Inc. to update its assessment. Surveyors conducted measurements in mid-December. The report is expected to be complete sometime this month. 

A steering committee of six people tasked with determining the library’s future and its location will meet to discuss the engineering report and determine next steps. 

At the Library Board’s most recent board meeting on Dec. 17, the board devoted less than five minutes to the issue.

“We are awaiting the new engineering study … to tell us how safe or, conversely, unsafe this building is,” Janice Langlinais, board chair, said. “Fingers crossed that it gives us the information we need to make sure we are safe in this building, or not safe, and make a plan.”

“Whether [the building] is unsafe now, in a short period of time, it will be,” Coos Bay Mayor Joe Benetti said. “What I fear is that we would have to close the library.”

“We need to do something,” Benetti continued. “A library is critical to a city and critical, as far as I’m concerned, for people to move here, to live here, and to have a quality of life for our citizenry.” 

The dire straits the library faces have been brought about by numerous factors. Whether city leaders and library supporters can overcome them and find a solution that keeps the library open, offering programming to its patrons, and meets the community’s needs remains unknown. 

The busiest place downtown

Coos Bay is the largest city on the Oregon Coast, with a population of nearly 16,000. The birthplace of Olympic distance runner Steve Prefontaine, Coos Bay is a working-class community that once thrived economically on its timber and fishing industries. 

Like many rural Oregon communities, Coos Bay has struggled to revitalize after the timber industry’s collapse. It does not attract as much coastal tourism as Cannon Beach or Seaside. Downtown is not full of tourist or novelty shops. In fact, it is not full at all. There is little foot traffic during the lunch hour or evening. Many storefronts are vacant and boarded up.

Evidence of Coos Bay’s grandeur still exists: the Egyptian Theatre, a 1,000-seat movie theater built in 1925 and one of the few Egyptian Revival style theaters in the country, reopened after the community formed a nonprofit group and fundraised the money needed for renovation. The Coos Art Museum is located in the former post office, an example of Art Deco architecture. 

And it exists in its public library, one of the busiest, if not the busiest, place in downtown Coos Bay.  

A few minutes before 10 o’clock on a recent Thursday morning, a half dozen people wait outside the library’s entrance. They quickly walk inside when a librarian opens the entrance’s automatic sliding doors. For the rest of the day, there would be a steady stream of traffic through those doors.

Within an hour, more than two dozen people have come to the library, to drop off books, pick up books on hold, to browse, to study at desks, using their laptops and the library’s free Wi-Fi. 

A large, brightly lit fridge is fully stocked with apples, oranges, onions, delicata squash, and potatoes. Added in 2022 to provide free and fresh produce, it is one of the library’s most-used programs, with between 4,ooo and 5,000 people getting food from it each month. 

The library takes up most of a city block, with another block dedicated to parking, on Anderson Avenue. The one-story building, approximately 32,000 square feet in size, feels enormous for the rural community. Inside, the library is expansive and spacious. Large windows on each wall fill the space with light, even on a gloomy Pacific Northwest day. 

The library’s collection is “extensive,” Pierson said, given the population the library serves. There are more than 80,000 books, as well as a large collection of audiobooks, DVDs, CDs, graphic novels, and board games. The Library of Things takes up a third of the wall behind the circulation desk. Among other items, patrons can check out a life jacket, an air fryer, a banjo, a bongo drum set, and a ghost-hunting kit. 

As in many rural Oregon communities, the library’s two meeting rooms, which respectively seat up to 22 people and 100 people, are available for free.

They see “nonstop usage,” Pierson said. “They are booked solid every day.” For library staff or library board meetings, “we have to get our stuff on the calendar first or we don’t get to use our own room.” All manner of groups rent the spaces: individuals making private calls for medical appointments or social services; attorneys whose offices are not accessible for clients with mobility issues; nonprofit boards; book clubs.

Then there’s the library’s programming, which hundreds of people attend each month. There are story times and book clubs and author talks, as well as monthly Dungeons and Dragons meetups, movie nights, family game nights, tea tastings, spice-of-the-month cooking classes, and a weekly men’s group.

On Dec. 23, the library hosted a “DIY Deer Making” class, in which participants made deer from logs and other materials. “Bring your hammer if you have one,” the class description urged. In July, the library hosted a Bollywood dance lesson. A juggling and “physical comedy show” took place in August. The library has hosted classes on fermentation, pressure and water-bath canning, raising rabbits for food, making felt gnomes, sewing, Zumba, yoga, and a birthday celebration for Frankenstein author Mary Shelley. 

Jan Doyle, 76, visits the library at least once a week. During this particular visit, she perused the board games section looking for games she could play with her four grandchildren while school and daycare were out for the holiday break. 

“It has a great kid’s section,” she said. She also has used the Library of Things and regularly attends a monthly Spanish class. “I love the library.”

Devan Martin, 32, used one word when describing what draws her and her three children to the library: “everything.” Her two oldest kids go to the library after school to do homework. Her youngest, in preschool, is learning to read. All are voracious readers.

The library’s monthly statistics bear out how heavily the library is used. Last year, the library issued between 73 and 100 new library cards and close to 1,500 people attended library programming. More than 8,000 people walked through the library’s doors. More than 16,000 books, audiobooks, games, movies, and other items were checked out.

“It’s really developed into quite the spot,” Mayor Benetti said. “That’s the sadness of it,” he added — if the library is forced to close, Coos County’s other libraries could not replicate what the Coos Bay Public Library has become.

Two failed bond measures

The library’s popularity and integral existence have not translated into residents’ willingness to tax themselves to construct a new library building. 

When considering how to address the failing building, the city decided not to replace the foundation and make other repairs; the cost to do so equals or exceeds the cost of a new building.

The bond measure that failed in the November 2024 election would have raised $30 million by taxing property owners $1.51 for every $1,000 of assessed value. That is the equivalent of $453 a year for a home valued at $300,000. 

With that money, the city proposed constructing a new building that would have added 10,000 square feet to the library. The library’s collection could increase, and there would be more meeting rooms, as well as outdoor space. Energy-efficient, the building would have been capable of handling modern technology.

The current building’s electrical panel is maxed out. “The age of the building impacts some things we can do,” Pierson said. “The computers have to stay where they are, because that’s the only place where there are plug-ins.”

The bond measure failed by 67 percent, with slightly more than 7,800 Coos Bay residents voting. Voters also rejected a countywide levy to fund the county’s jail.

When reflecting on the bond’s failure, sources universally point to the cost. Coos County is one of the 10 poorest counties in Oregon. In Coos Bay, the poverty rate is 15.6 percent, according to Data USA, and the median income is $60,000. The home ownership rate is high at 70 percent, meaning the bond would have directly affected the majority of voters.

“It has to do with cost and price and people not wanting to pay anything more,” Pierson said. At the same time, she argued the library offsets those costs, given that all its services are free.

“Economics always plays a factor,” Benetti said.

In the runup to the 2024 election, only one editorial about the bond appeared in the city newspaper, The World. “The voters will reject the idea because the members of this community are already in financial dire straits. A new multi-million-dollar library is not a luxury we can afford. Hell, groceries aren’t a luxury many of us can afford,” Coos Bay resident Mark Dearsteadt wrote.

It was the second failed attempt to pass a bond for a new building.

In 2022, voters rejected a $20 million bond measure that would have financed a 32,000-square-foot building in John Topits Park, a 120-acre natural area that is densely forested, includes hiking and cycling paths, and a children’s playground.

The park is named for John Topits, a former city councilor who dedicated years to preserving the park. It is located in Coos Bay’s Empire neighborhood, which is located farther inland, out of the tsunami zone and where nearly half of Coos Bay’s population lives.

Those factors, as well as the close proximity to Southwestern Oregon Community College and a Boys and Girls Club, made moving the library appealing to city and library leaders.

The library would have been built adjacent to a 911 dispatch center and emergency response center. In emergencies, the library would have been an evacuation site. 

While city leaders were excited by the idea, many residents were not. There was outcry over trees that would be cut down. Many wanted the library to remain downtown, due to the central location and proximity to Marshfield Junior High and Marshfield High School.

“It’s important for kids this age to have somewhere to go,” Martin, the mother of three, said. “South of [Highway] 101, there’s not a lot of places where they can sit and work on homework and have Wi-Fi.”

“We got a lot of pushback,” Benetti admitted. But the city moved ahead. The bond measure failed by 60 percent.

By the time city leaders considered trying again during the 2024 election, building costs had increased so much that the price tag for a new library grew from $20 million to $30 million.

“As time goes on, it will only become more expensive” to build a new building, Langlinais, the library board chair, said.

A lack of engagement and strategy

Multiple factors contributed to the failure of the two bond measures.  

The library is a city agency, so only Coos Bay residents could vote on the bond measures. But people from smaller communities throughout Coos County use the library. “There are lots of us library users who don’t get to vote on the bond,” said Doyle, who lives near Charleston.

Astoria’s public library recently reopened after an extensive, year-long renovation, partially financed by a bond residents overwhelmingly supported in November 2022. Leading up to the election, library staff and volunteers canvassed, knocking on doors. Editorials by proponents were published in The Daily Astorian.

In Coos Bay, there was no such campaign effort. “What I saw is that there was no clear coordination to … put consistent messaging out for the bond,” Jacob Niebergall, a Coos Bay city councilor and member of the library’s board, said.

One place many Oregonians look for information when voting is the voters’ pamphlet they receive in their mailboxes. In Astoria’s case, a local voters’ pamphlet included an explanatory statement about the bond, what it would pay for, and why it was needed. There were six arguments in favor of the bond, written individually or jointly by Astoria’s current and former mayors, two school administrators, a representative of the local Chamber of Commerce, citizens, and members of the library’s advisory board, Friends group, and its foundation.

But the November 2024 voters’ pamphlet Coos Bay residents received contained no information about the Coos Bay bond. Coos County does not produce a local pamphlet; for candidate or measure statements to appear in the statewide pamphlet, jurisdictions must have a population of more than 50,000, well above that of Coos Bay.

The Coos Bay Public Library’s website has a page devoted to information about the building and what a bond measure would have funded. But numerous library patrons interviewed by Oregon ArtsWatch were unaware of the seriousness of the building’s structural issues. Some patrons did not vote on the library bond, one way or the other.

In various communities around Oregon, grassroots citizens groups have emerged to advocate for their local libraries. Most recently, a group of citizens in Grant County formed and is working tirelessly to keep its county library open. When Seaside’s public library faced two controversial book challenges, citizens formed Freedom to Read Seaside. In Grants Pass, a citizens group advocates for its library and “the many ways libraries are crucial to thriving communities.”

No such group has emerged in Coos Bay. 

Clair Williamson, 26, voted in favor of the bond. “Libraries are the backbone of a healthy society,” she said. “Libraries are a place to learn, a place for community to meet, to feed curiosity.” She visits the library “a few times a month” to check out books and games, and attend various programs.

She thinks Coos Bay citizens have few ways to learn about local issues (the print edition of the Coos Bay World publishes once a week, and the website requires a subscription). 

Ballot measures, she thinks, are “words often asking for your money.”

“It’s hard to connect that to people,” she continued. “It takes people to put a ballot measure on the ballot. But I don’t know who they are. That is a problem, but it is a fixable problem. It takes intentionality.”

Contingency plans and no good options

If the library must vacate its building relatively quickly, Pierson has what she calls a “bug-out plan.” The 12-page document details how the library would operate if most of the collection were in storage, and the cost.

“My staff was amazingly creative during the pandemic,” Pierson said. “We would be amazingly creative again.”

The plan outlines three types of space that would be needed: an area open to the public, a warehouse-type space where staff could access the library’s collection, and a storage space for furniture and materials that do not need to be frequently accessed.

Approximately 15,800 square feet is needed for “barebones operations.” The plan details what would be needed in each space, in terms of office and work space, shelving, and equipment. Pierson and her colleagues arrived at the estimates after inventorying and measuring the library’s shelving and their square footage.

Rent is estimated to be $312,120 each year, plus moving costs, and $50,000 for new furniture to replace built-in pieces that cannot be removed. The costs do not include costs for utilities or any needed renovations.  

The city is actively searching for a building that is currently, or soon will be, for sale or for lease that the library could move into. Ideally, the building would be downtown, have adequate parking, and be approximately 30,000 square feet in size.

Buildings that size are few and far between in Coos Bay. The city is eyeing two. At one, parking is not ideal; it’s not clear whether the second location will be for sale. 

The city has contacted private developers to discuss the potential of building a mixed-use building that would include the library — such as a multi-story building with housing on the top floors, and the library on the bottom floor.

Such a development would take years to complete.

The likeliest scenario is that, in the near future, the library will move into a smaller building. Programming would be limited and there might not be access to computers or internet. The majority of the library’s collection would be stored off-site. Instead of browsing, patrons would check out materials ahead of time, then pick them up.

“Knowing that there’s books I don’t get to look at is sad,” Williamson said. “I wouldn’t know what I’m missing.” She thinks the broader community would immediately feel the impact if the library’s meeting rooms were no longer available. 

“These computers are used all the time,” Doyle said. “It’s so sad. People might wake up” if the library is forced to vacate its location. 

Niebergall is a new member of the steering committee tasked with determining the library’s future, as is Kara Long, the former executive director of the Egyptian Theatre.

“Nobody wants to have the building shut and you have to request books and then come pick up. There’s no joy in [that],” Niebergall said. “The ideal scenario is that we still have a library in Coos Bay that is accessible to our entire community.”

Long wants to reach out to various community organizations, such as the Coos Art Museum, to see if they could host some of the library’s programming if the library moves to a smaller location. She also wants to see more citizen engagement, including hosting listening sessions.

“We need to find creative ways to keep our library going,” she said. “Until it’s gone, people don’t realize how much of an asset the library is.”

“We haven’t had community buy-in on what the solution looks like,” Niebergall said. “We’ve got to get people out knocking on doors to have those face-to-face conversations.”

Langlinais thinks the library suffers from a PR problem about what a public library is, and how it serves the community. “We need to reframe what a library is,” the board chair said. “It’s more than checking out a book. It’s a place to gather, to learn, to connect. A library is part of the livability of a community.”

The library was last renovated in 1998. The building was expanded, and its roof and HVAC system were replaced. During the grand reopening, Joanne Verger, Coos Bay’s mayor at the time, spoke.

“Our library remains the center of community activity with increased circulation and expanding services for its loyal patrons,” she said. “I hope that in the future, the library will always be considered the city’s crown jewel and never be neglected.”