Monday, December 01, 2003
The Kansas City Public Library
by David Arthur Walters
The Kansas City Public Library is a gray, glass-panelled box at 12th and Oak. It juts up inharmoniously from behind its two-story, brown stone facade, a monstrous combination in keeping with the generally haphazard juxtaposition of old and new buildings in Downtown Kansas City - as if the new wants to insult the old. (1) The entrance was crowded with loiterers and was filthy when I arrived. I walked over to the front desk and applied for a temporary library card so that I could gain access to the computers and write about Downtown Kansas City. My application was processed on the spot by a very efficient but rather dour person who, I am glad to say, gruffly fended off efforts to interrupt her. I was handed a bar-coded card, free of charge, which I can use to check out books, and, most importantly, to use the library's brand-new Pharos computer system. A librarian, a mature, pleasant lady, was glad to show me the ropes. The system provides access to the Internet and to a broad array of software including word processing, spreadsheet, resume and game programs.
I toured the library and noted that, although its collection is much smaller than that of the University of Hawaii's Hamilton Library back home, it includes more recently published books in my liberal areas of interest than does the Hamilton. I also noticed that eight out of ten Kansas City Library users appeared to be poor and/or homeless, and were obviously taking refuge in the library for its warmth and restroom facilities.
Several refugees from the winter chill were sitting alone at tables with no reading material before them. Others were engaged in conversations and occasional arguments, sometimes loudly enough to be disturbing, yet they were making no more noise than some of the library employees who were talking on the telephones, helping people find books, or chatting with each other at a distance in the stacks.
Yet other poor folk were enjoying games on the computers, or were perusing sports, celebrity and music web-sites - headphones are provided for the public's listening pleasure. Two well dressed young men were yelling at each other in the east wing on the first floor; the security guard came over and courteously reminded them that they were in a library, therefore they should keep their voices down. They, in turn, loudly berated him for interrupting them - he asked them to leave and ushered them out. The two were replaced by a man who reeked of urine; he proceeded to entertain us, singing a song.
I noticed during my tour that the third floor, once known as the Missouri Valley Room, set aside for the special collection including genealogical documents, was much quieter and more sedate than the first and second floors. A bookcase with five shelves stands in the corner of the pleasant reading room, representing the 1874 beginning of the Kansas City Public Library. It was purchased with eight out of one-hundred dollars raised from six lectures to buy books - the first books were an eight-volume set of the American Encyclopedia.
In retrospect it is rather amazing how much can ensue from nothing but an idea and a few willing people. Who knows? perhaps this little journal of mine will become a great magazine someday, entitled Downtown Kansas City.
I listened to part of the man's song on the first floor, and recalled seeing a notice of a play called 'Urinetown'. I went back up to the third floor to log onto the computer system - I figured the Missouri Valley Room would be a more peaceful place to post my first piece. The Mexican entrepreneurs were conversing with each other there - my espanol is not so good but I think they were talking about Mary Jane. I discovered later that drugs are stashed behind books bearing certain Dewey Decimal System numbers - the drugs are retrieved after paying the dealers out front.
Furthermore, I had not accounted for the fact that the library has only two public mens rooms with one toilet each. One of them, which can be locked on the inside by the occupant, is on the third floor near the computers where I chose to work. Homeless people use the bathroom facilities not only to relieve themselves but to change and wash clothes and to bathe in the little sink, wherefore a line tends to form on the third floor, especially in the morning. The ladies room is kept locked from the outside - the men in line ask the librarians for the key to the ladies room but to no avail.
No sooner had I logged onto a computer than someone started banging on the door of the mens room. He shouted that he would defecate on the floor unless the occupant opened the door. I did my best to focus on writing my first email report on Kansas City as the yelling continued.
Someone yelled, "He shit on the floor! He shit on the damned floor!"
When the stench of fresh human excrement reached my nostrils, I did not take a journalist's interest in verifying its placement - I saved my email draft and went downstairs to the second floor, where I read books on positive thinking for awhile. Then I tried to log onto a computer downstairs, but I was barred from doing so with a statement that I had used up my alotted ninety minutes. Alas, I had only been on line ten minutes before that man had allegedly crapped on the floor! Wherefore I learned to log out with a reboot after each session - someone had sat down at the computer I had been using upstairs and swiped my time.
Come to think of it, ninety minutes a day is not very much time to drum up an positive urban spirit in Kansas City by means of short little articles on the downtown scene, which happens to be a dead scene at present. In fact, ninety minutes a day is hardly enough time to conduct serious research and writing on any subject whatsoever. The supply of computers usually exceeds the demand for them, so perhaps some exception to the rule should be made since it would not interfere with sports and music entertainment usage. I asked a librarian whether a special dispensation might be made for serious users - "That would be highly unlikely."
During the course of my usage, I noticed someone associated with the Mexican entrepreneurs using the same computer every day for three to four hours per sitting - my investigation revealed that he does not have a library card - I believe he is an immigrant without the identification required to obtain one. I observed another individual, who apparenlty has several library cards and/or card numbers and PIN numbers, come around to hand out more time to him.
Since the possession of multiple cards or confidential card date could result in the theft not only of computer time but other property, not to mention untraceable breaches of national security, I tried to report this activity several times. An insider told me that the computer program developers were "complete idiots", and that the "firewalls" were inadequate.
At first there was a complete lack of interest in recording the information I was eager to provide. I went up to the fifth floor offices and sashayed through the information system department, declaring to all within earshot that there was a "scandalous breach of security" and "a hole in the new computer system big enough to drive a truck through." I said if only someone would take a look at once they would apprehend an unauthorized user who was abusing the system as I spoke. I was told that the deputy director was the only one whom I could speak with about the matter; since the deputy director was in a meeting, I would have to come back some other time.
I persisted - in the Missouri Valley Room - and finally three librarians took a keen interest in my concerns, looked into the matter and discovered that my complaint had merits. Since they did not thank me for my efforts, I thanked them for listening to me and for helping the people of Missouri and visitors improve the library.
Now, then, I have not said that drug dealers, vagrants, vagabonds, runaway kids, or unfortunate homeless people are running or ruining the downtown library. I do not suppose that the library would fill up with the bourgeois reading public and intellectuals if the usual suspects disappeared. There is a general lack of interest in coming anywhere downtown for any reason whatsoever except to work. One librarian did say the abusers had frightened away "legitimate" users. Another said he does not want to personally intercede with the abusers or get involved in the bathroom disputes; he said his on-the-job experience with the homeless including their disrespect for the library staff has rendered him a bit cynical about their plight. In any event, the majority of present library users are relatively quiet, and they do mind their own business. Some do study; two regulars appear to be writing books - they certainly can type up a storm. As with other populations, a small minority of careless or thoughtless people tend to get out of hand.
The security force at the Kansas City Library tries to keep order given the civil rights everyone has according to current law, but it could do much better. For one thing, with the third-floor mens room - security rarely appears there despite its great nuisance. On the whole, the library is a "blight" in comparison to other government buildings in the area frequented by the public.
As for the beleaguered and beseiged librarians, they are of the highest caliber, and they do provide excellent professional service to users. Several said that they love their jobs very much but were tormented by the deplorable public circumstances.
What Kansas City, Missouri, obviously needs is some sort of constructive and productive day center for the down-and-out folk from the half-way houses, shelters, and detention centers in the area. Many people are on the streets because of misfortune and injustice. They need a hand up. Besides work, they need bathrooms, laundry facilities, showers, lockers, and access to telephones. Of course a few of them need to be in mental institutions or jails where they can be supervised and rehabilitated, and that is one reason why the downtown area around the library and police headquarters and city hall is so dangerous after dark.
In January 2004 the downtown library will be moved into the old First National Bank Building at 10th and Baltimore. It will allegedly have adequate restroom facilities. No doubt such a big move will require many strong hands and backs. The work will be outsourced to a moving company. Perhaps a few temporary jobs will be available as a consequence. And hopefuly the new library will not be a blight on the new downtown location. A new public library was an essential component of Denver's successful downtown revitalization.
Notes:
(1) In retrospect I wondered if I had made an Internet fool of myself with my criticism of the architectural design of the library and the city, hence I returned to the library a few days later and looked for information about Kansas City architecture. I found George Erlich's Kansas City, Missouri, An Architectural History, 1826-1990, by George Erhlich, on a first-floor shelf. I carried the book up to the Missouri Valley Room, sat down at a table, and soon noticed that the author, in his first preface, acknowledged the staff of that illustrious room for their help. I was pleased to find a photo of the Kansas City Public Library in the chapter entitled, 'Retreat from the Past: 1950-1970.' This is what I learned:
In 1957 the Kansas City Chapter of the American Institute of Architects produced a massive study (KC/80) of the Downtown Kansas City area, summarized by a large model of the central business district. Large areas were plotted for a modern vital core but preservation was ignored. The Public Library and Board of Education Building, designed by Edward W. Tanner and completed in 1959, was the first modern structure to break away from the tall, 'Neo-classical' style in the Civic Center.
Mr. Ehlich stated that the new library is "definitely modern in appearance for its period. Hence it provided valuable, symbolic significance for a community that had been told over and over again that the library on Ninth was woefully out of date as well as overcrowded."
However, he continues, "The new library also illustrates a problem of reconciling the style of new buildings with the style(s) of older ones in the area. For years the problem was ignored with varying results. In the case of the library and civic center, the problem was more pressing. For this was the first, sizable government building to be added to the Center somce the Courhouse, the City Hall, and the Municipal Courts Building had been built. As it stands, the library is a rather awkward visual addition to the mid-thirties civic center. It does not extend the basic plan for the complex... and though some limestone is used for a podium of lower stories to support a short massive tower of metal and glass, the library neither ocntinues nor really complements the style of the older buildings."
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