Basement of Hanover library to be closed until March

Dec. 07--The basement of Guthrie Memorial Library will be closed into March because of a wastewater leak on Wednesday morning.

Borough Manager Barbara Krebs confirmed that the John D. Bare Center located in the basement of the library will be closed until March to give crews time to replace carpet and sanitize the area. Assistant borough manager Ed Reed said the sheetrock on the bottoms of the walls and some miscellaneous items also suffered water damage. Borough facilities are insured by Selective Insurance with a $5,000 deductible, he added.

Reed said a pair of sewage pumps failed in the basement, allowing wastewater to cover the carpeted floor of the Bare Center. Tuesday evening, contracted plumbers came to check the float system for the pumps, which move waste water from the basement rest rooms to the sanitary sewer line on the main floor. The plumbers believed the problem was resolved when they left that night.

"We had an intermittent fault in the float," he said. "You could sit and watch it forever and it might not malfunction. You could do it 20 times and it works fine. On the 21st it might put things out of order."

On Wednesday, a different set of plumbers replaced the floats, Reed said.

Adult Services Librarian Connie McInturff said all meetings scheduled for the Bare Center are in the process of being rescheduled. Smaller groups will be relocated to other parts of the library, but a few larger events may be cancelled.

"We were pretty fortunate because most things scheduled are for smaller groups of people," she said.

The former children's library on the top floor of Guthrie Memorial Library is also in the process of having carpet replaced. The area had been stripped of its carpet while being repurposed for lease to a private business that planned to use the space as a special-events venue.

Hanover Borough Council reversed its decision on the lease in October and last week voted to accept a $37,350 bid from CB Flooring in Harrisburg to finish the children's library carpet project by Feb. 28.

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