Aylmer council votes 5-1 for library expansion

Warning: this story contains strong language

“The time has come to make a decision,” Mayor Jack Couckuyt told fellow Aylmer council members at a special meeting at Old Town Hall, about that building’s future, on Wednesday, Oct. 15.

They voted 5-1 in favour of an option to expand the Old Town Hall library and upstairs opera house at an estimated cost of $8.9-million. Voting to proceed with that option were Mayor Couckuyt, Deputy Mayor Pete Barbour and councillors Jamie Chapman, Arthur Oslach and William Barber.

Cr. Kathryn Desrosiers opposed doing so.

Immediately after the vote, Tyler Desrosiers, spouse of Cr. Desrosiers, from the gallery of the opera house, hurled expletives toward council.

“People aren’t going to be able to eat,” he yelled without identifying himself. “You’re all full of shit, every single one of you.”

“Fuck you!” he concluded. He then left the gallery.

The proposal is to renovate existing parts of Old Town Hall and add a two-storey addition at the back of the heritage building and a one-storey addition to the south.

That would mean that the ground-floor library could expand from the current 3,000 square feet to 10,000, which was the minimum being sought by the Elgin County library system.

The theatre would also receive some improvements, including accessible washrooms, a larger lobby space, a better catering kitchen and a new, separate entrance with its own elevator.

However, a final decision about whether or not to actually spend the money on construction would have to wait until a new council took office late next year, town Administrator Andy Grozelle pointed out.

First, detailed planning would be needed, and, under provincial legislation, the current council could do nothing that would be binding on a future council.

Deputy Mayor Barbour moved proceeding with the expansion option.

Others had included a standalone library on parkland just south of Old Town Hall, or one in the municipal parking lot east of it.

Cr. Desrosiers was quick to speak, stating that young residents of town were concerned about taking on a financial burden of such magnitude, and how that would affect Aylmer’s property tax in future.

The community was clearly divided on whether or not to proceed with the Old Town Hall expansion or move the town library branch to East Elgin Community Complex, she said, and the controversy would likely be a major subject in municipal elections in 2026.

She then said that five of the council members at the meeting had been acclaimed in the last election, and one had been elected on not reopening the idea of expanding the downtown library.

(That one was Mayor Couckuyt, who would respond later in the session.)

“Let’s allow the community a real chance to have a say,” she said, suggesting that a decision be deferred until the next council was in office.

Deputy Mayor Barbour said that, no matter how elected, council members “periodically have to make tough decisions.

The idea of expanding the town’s library had been around for 20 years, he continued. He believed now was the time “to move forward and do something.”

He said funding for the project would come from three sources, the first being fundraising. Some members of the community had already expressed a willingness “to donate significant amounts.”

Secondly, if the town had a “shovel-ready project,” it would be in a much better position to seek provincial and federal grants if and as new programs became available.

As for tax spending, the 2026 town budget would not be affected by a decision to proceed, he said. “This is looking toward the future.”

Cr. Oslach said the library debate had been going on for too many years. “It’s time to settle it.”

He had read the dozens of written submissions that had been received from the public and was in favour of proceeding with the Old Town Hall expansion.

He feared losing the library would lead to a derelict downtown.

Simcoe used to have a great downtown core, he lamented, but businesses had moved out.

“Downtown Simcoe is a ghost town,” he said. “Do we want the same thing for Aylmer?”

Cr. Jamie Chapman said the County of Elgin raised the library issue this term, not Mayor Couckuyt.

If the town didn’t have a larger space for the Aylmer library by the end of the current lease as of Jan. 1, 2028, “It will not be good.”

Her decision was based on many factors, such as watching children over the years walking back and forth from town schools to the downtown library.

That just wouldn’t happen at the Complex, she said. It was too far away, and Thames Valley District School Board didn’t have funding for buses for day trips.

The economic value of having the library downtown “is huge,” she said.

As for a public delegation from Johnny Friesen who spoke earlier in the meeting about growing up poor in Aylmer, and walking to the library for access to computers because his parents didn’t have a car, she responded, “That still happens.

“What about a single mom who doesn’t have transportation? I was one of them.”

Having the best library in the world wouldn’t matter if no one could reach it, she stated.

If the library was moved to the Complex, “We are losing so much,” including $30,000 a year in rent that Elgin County paid for its current space at Old Town Hall.

Occupying Imperial Hall full-time would also deter hockey tournaments using the Complex, because they needed the additional space, and the same with summer hockey schools.

Cr. Chapman continued, “To me, a community is about treating everyone equally.”

The downtown expansion would be expensive, she allowed, but like buying a new home, purse strings might have to be tightened, but when it was paid off in 15 or 16 years, ‘You have something wonderful.”

Cr. Desrosiers said that keeping the library downtown would be easier for those who resided in that area, but not those from other areas. “To me, it’s a wash.”

She agreed with Mr. Friesen, who had suggested that he wouldn’t let his daughters walk to the library wherever it was, over concerns about safety on modern streets.

Some parents couldn’t take the time to drive their children to the library, she continued, because they were working two or three jobs.

“Because of our economy, the cost of living,” she said. To pay a property tax increase for the downtown expansion, “They’re probably going to have to get a fourth job.”

She also accused Cr. Chapman being “disconnected from the realities of our financial state.”

Paying off a house was no longer possible in 15 or 16 years, Cr. Desrosiers said.

As for provincial and federal grants, they were no longer being directed toward cultural assets like libraries, she said.

Mayor Couckuyt said if the town didn’t provide 10,000 square feet downtown for a library, “It will go somewhere else,” possibly to the Complex or even to a private rental space.

“That would be a crying shame for downtown Aylmer,” he believed.

As for claims the town couldn’t afford the project, Aylmer’s finance director hadn’t yet had a chance to put numbers together, including how the expansion would be paid for, he said. “We can finance this,” as the town had done with development of a new industrial park, the Elk Street reconstruction project this year and the recent building of a new water tower.

“Each one of those is a library,” he declared.

As for running for office on the basis he wouldn’t raise the library as an issue, “I kind of got pushed into it by the county.”

He believed part of the problem was a fundamental misunderstanding about what libraries were.

They weren’t just about books. “It’s a place where people can go and have a ‘third place’,” outside their homes and workplaces.

“It’s a pity that it’s just about money,” he said.
(AE/contributed by JPM Architecture Inc.)