Reviving Alvar

By Francine Fialkoff -- Library Journal, 9/15/2006

When Library Journal launched the “Library Makeover” concept in 2005 at the Queens Borough Public Library in New York, we had no idea that Hurricane Katrina (and Rita) would cause us to scale up our efforts so quickly. But when the storms hit, we knew that our next “makeover” had to be in one of the affected areas.

While that first project was no small feat, it was largely cosmetic. The Alvar Street Branch restoration in New Orleans was complicated not only by the destruction of furnishings but also by the loss of all the books, other materials, and computers that make a library viable.

We had several goals at the outset. We wanted to restore a library in a neighborhood that was on the road to recovery and that had people living in it and returning home to it. We wanted the makeover to be quick: people in New Orleans had been worn down by the dislocations in their lives and by dealing with FEMA and other government agencies. We wanted to make it as easy as possible for the New Orleans Public Library (NOPL) staff, which at the time we began numbered only 19—and they were busy serving customers and keeping the few open branches operational. And, no small order, we wanted the services (or as many of them as possible) and materials to be donated. The library and city were both operating on a shoestring.

Alvar Before

LJ served as a conduit for vendors, publishers, distributors, and others in the library community to channel their commitment to libraries and to the role they play in sustaining—and rebuilding—community. This one small library in the Ninth Ward became the focal point for that passion.

Alvar After

My personal thanks go to Jeff Scherer, principal at Meyer, Scherer & Rockcastle, Ltd., an architecture and interior design firm, without whom none of this would have been possible; the generous and unfazed George Coe at Baker & Taylor; Ron Biava at the NOPL Foundation, who raised the money to pay for the hard labor that went into bringing Alvar back; contractor Keith Boudreaux, who made it all happen on time; the devoted NOPL team, including former director Bill Johnson, Geraldine Harris, Linda Marshall Hill, Elizabeth Konrad, and Tania Tetlow; the Quills Literacy Foundation (like LJ, an RBI organization), which donated seed money to NOPL; and the LJ staff. Their contributions—and that of the vendors, suppliers, and publishers who gave freely of their wares, their time, and their expertise—are on display in this story.

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