Councilmember Alan Gerson thinks his best chance to get the money for Battery Park City’s library is a city budget adjustment at the end of the year.
Sayar Lonial, Gerson’s aide, and library officials assured concerned residents at this week’s Community Board 1’s Battery Park City Committee that construction will not be delayed if they get the money by November or December — when the midyear budget modification is announced.
After funding for construction of the library’s interior was left out of this year’s city budget, Gerson was trying to find additional funding either from the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation or through a midyear budget modification.
While construction on the library’s core and shell is underway, they are waiting on money from the city to begin work on the interior in January. On Tuesday, Lonial assured the Battery Park City Committee that Councilmember Gerson is “100 percent committed to getting the library.”
The library will be housed in the Riverhouse condo building at 1 River Terrace. Construction is expected to take 18 to 20 months after the core and shell are completed with a projected opening for spring 2010.
— Anindita Dasgupta
