The Pikes Peak Library District Board of Trustees approved the purchase of the property for the Ruth Holley and Ute Pass libraries for a combined $2.64 million during their meeting Wednesday evening. 

The approval comes less than a year after the board voted 5-2 to shut down the Rockrimmon Library, which ceased operations at the end of November, according to previous reporting by The Gazette.

The board heard from eight speakers about confusion in how these purchases can happen while the Rockrimmon Library was closed for budgetary reasons. About 20 people sat through the nearly 2½-hour meeting who applauded after each speaker and after the final passage of the Ruth Holley Library property. 

“It just seems like we’re putting the cart before the horse with some of these decisions,” Shawn Brennan, a library volunteer, told the board. “Now, in general, I am actually for buying Ruth Holley — again it’s just kind of not having a coherent plan.”

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Trustee Debbie English, a Rockrimmon resident, said during the meeting that “no one’s heart was broken more than mine” when the library branch closed. 

“I understand the concerns about trust and transparency and I understand that it hurts to see us vote on buying a library after the Rockrimmon Library was closed,” said English, who voted against the library’s closure last year. “I get it, I feel it, I understand. But at the same time, we have an opportunity to do something good and we should.”

Later in the forum, Trustee Angela Duggan broke decorum by interrupting Jacquire Ostrom several times within about 30 seconds while hypothesizing the reasons for the Rockrimmon closure.

“I still think there must be some other reason why you would close the Rockrimmon Library that has not ever been made public, that you have some other agenda? I don’t know if it’s book banning or religious, whatever … but it’s not money,” Ostrom said before being interrupted. 

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Duggan began laughing at the notion that book bans contributed to the closure, to which Ostrom said, “that’s what people are coming to” because they “can’t figure out any other reason” for Rockrimmon Library’s closure. 

Duggan later apologized for breaking decorum.

Numerous trustees said during the meeting that PPLD is searching for a library location on the northwest side of Colorado Springs but could not discuss details publicly. 

The Ruth Holley purchase is $2.24 million and is located in an area Trustee Board President Julie Smyth described to The Gazette as a “literacy-need hotspot.” The funding for the purchase will come from:

• $1 million from the PPLD Foundation.
• $600,000 from the PPLD reserve.
• $400,000 from the PPLD capital contingency fund.
• $200,000 from the Price Family Foundation.
• $48,000 from the Colorado Trust Fund interest.

The Ute Pass Library purchase is $400,000 — $90,000 less than the appraisal — and will be paid for fully by the PPLD reserve. The library could expand its hours of operation from 28 per week to “up to 140” through a hybrid access pilot program, according to PPLD CEO Teona Shainidze-Krebs.