March 2025

After last month’s “indefinite” postponement of the vote on the size of the new NE Library by Robert Judge, the board will once again take up the issue at this month’s meeting. 

As a refresher: Last month, Both the designer and the NE Library Community Committee, after reviewing all the relevant data and presentations, recommended the construction of the largest library (20,500 sq. ft) outlined with the widest range of community options. In response, some members of the library board waffled and delayed, claiming that after four years, two committees, multiple community surveys and mountains of data, they still didn’t have enough information to make a decision.

My feeling is that the board is going to try to lowball this one – either go with a smaller library footprint than the one recommended by the committee or find some other way to undercut this process once again. 

However.

The ONLY thing that has kept the NE Library project alive and moving forward up to this point is YOU. The community has shown amazing support for building this library, and has kept up LOUD, SUSTAINED PRESSURE on these officials at every turn. We can’t stop now, y’all. We MUST write, call, and attend these meetings, and DEMAND that the Northside of Lafayette gets the largest library, because they NEED it, and they DESERVE it.

So PLEASE make an effort to provide some input for this. You can call, write, show up at the meeting and speak, or all three.

Luckily, we have a guide to contacting both the library board and local elected officials. 

Want to show up at the meeting, but not sure what to expect? We’ve got you covered there, too.

Need some talking points? The NE Community Committee gave several reasons for their recommendation:  

1. Current need for the large, underserved area the library will serve justifies the necessity of the larger option
2. Future anticipated population growth on the Northside, including new, incoming commercial development, will fuel demand for a larger library to serve the area now and into the future
3. The need for workforce education in an area of the parish seeing explosive commercial growth.

Please try to make it to the meeting if you can. A big crowd is important – it shows the board as well as any officials present that the community supports this library. Feel free to grab the graphic below as well, and share it across your socials before the meeting on Monday.