A tiff over funding for the Sechelt Public Library has divided the Sunshine Coast Regional District Board and raised the spectre of a legal battle between the library and the SCRD. At the May 13 SCRD board meeting, Halfmoon Bay director John Marian proposed that the SCRD withdraw from its contract to contribute to library funding. That motion was defeated by a tie vote. A second motion, that the SCRD board seek a legal opinion on the library-funding contract, passed.
Halfmoon Bay contributed $62,000 to the Sechelt library for 2004. Garry Foxall, chair of the library board, said in a letter to the SCRD that, according to the funding formula in the contract, Halfmoon Bay's contribution should have been $72,717. The library board could only conclude "the contract for library service has not been honoured," said the letter.
Marian responded with a letter of his own saying the blame lies with Sechelt Mayor Cam Reid for failing to deliver "accounting details" about the cost of the library building. Marian wants to know how much of the construction cost went to the library part of the building and how much to the municipal offices "shoe-horned" onto the second floor. The SCRD will discuss the possibility of regional library funding at a special board meeting on May 26.
