Library work nears final chapter

If you were wondering why you couldnt check out books at the Johnson City Public Library this week, theres a good reason.

From the outside looking in, the librarys staff resembled a team of worker bees, working to finish lengthy renovation projects in their workplace hive. Shutting down the library from Monday until Sunday was a necessity, Bob Swanay, the director of the library, said as crews installed new carpet, moved furniture and refinished hardwood floors on the first and second floors.

There were a few other things that we wanted to get done, that we knew we needed to get done, that we just kind of (have) taken advantage of this whole project, Swanay said.

After a few hits and misses concerning the carpet, the goose chase was over and the new carpet from Mohawk Industries Inc. in Calhoun, Ga., arrived ready to be installed.

Swanay said the carpet problem delayed a lot of their renovation completion plans dating back to last fall.

Our expectation was to reopen the area in early October ... but we just never were able to do it because of the carpet, he said. Until we had carpet down, we couldnt do the furniture or the computers or the shelving.

Swanay said Mohawk Group, wanting to fix the mistakes, gave the library a more expensive, better quality carpet at no additional cost, and also donated additional carpet for the library to redo the meeting room, the elevators and the front walkways.

With the carpet squared away, library staff helped put together shelves and move items around to their new home.

The second floor is where the major action has happened. Thats where youll see the brand new computer center, Swanay said. Weve always had computers for the public in the library, but in the previous layout the computers were kind of scattered around the reference desk on the second floor and we had computer carrel furniture.

Saying goodbye to the carrels, the PC computers available for the public will now be in a designated location, facing a newly built wall with a SmartBoard attached.

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Library work nears final chapter