Tolland PZC Gives Positive Feedback to Library Project

A project designed to expand the Tolland Public Library into the adjacent gymnasium at the Hicks Municipal Center has another big fan. 

The Planning and Zoning Commission. 

In a memo to Town Manager Steven Werbner dated Tuesday, Director of Planning and Community Development Linda Farmer said the PZC on Monday voted unanimously to submit a positive referral for the project. 

The endorsement is subject to verification that sufficient parking will be available. 

The project is designed to create some much-needed space. The Town Council tried to set a public hearing date a week ago, but the vote wound up in a deadlock and council members tabled the matter. Council members are supposed to discuss a new hearing date on Tuesday. 

The hearing is designed to present and take comment on a $2.6-million bonding issue that would fund the project.

Steven Jones, the secretary of the Tolland Democratic Town Committee, is trying to collect 462 signatures for force the issue onto the November ballot. 

Werbner is researching, through the town's legal staff, just what type of question could be placed into the ballot through a petition. Normally, a bond vote follows a bonding resolution adopted by the council. 

The library project will not only expand the book and tech space, but create more of a community gathering place, proponents said. 

The project would also solve the final piece of the accessibility puzzle that has plagued the lower end of the Hicks Center for more than a dozen years.