Animosity Towards the Peru Public Library Remains

Yesterday was a very full day of information and news in the city of Peru and through the week we hope to cover many of the stories. Last night at the informal meeting, Mayor Harl brought up the subject of the 2 seats on the Peru Library that would be up in February. He stated it has been his policy to retain the same people if they wished to continue in that position which is a volunteer position with no reimbursement. He then said both of those people had indicated they wished to retain their seats on the Library Board. At this point Ald. Ankiewicz spoke up and expressed his extreme opposition to the reappointment of these two individuals and went on to state that in his opinion they were a part of the problem at the Library that resulted in the library pressing for the money they were entitled to by State Law from the City of Peru. Of course I don't believe he used the words entitled to. At this point, Ald. Ferrari reminded him that if the city had been paying the library what they were entitled to through the years this would not have happened. Ald. O'Beirne said he also had 2 people who wanted to serve on that same board. Mayor Harl said that he had had 6 applications for the positions. On Mondays formal meeting there will need to be one alderman making the motion to retain and they will need one second for the 2 to be retained on the Library Board. Suddenly positions for which there had been little enthusiasm to participate in has a line of people that want to be sitting on the Library Board. Perhaps this might be the time for those who don't get either of the 2 seats to become visitors to the meetings and see how the new found money is spent. And it would also be an asset to our community if those in opposition to the increased funding also spent some time seeing how the money will be spent.