Frazier Community Library evicted from high school

PERRYOPOLIS, Pa. (KDKA) -- The Fraizer Community Library and Frazier School District Library shared the same place at the high school in Perryopolis, but not anymore. The school board voted to take full control of it, leaving the town without a library for the first time in six decades. 

The friends of the Frazier Community Library were hoping the Frazier school board would just say no to evicting them from where they've been since 1960. Instead, the board told them it's time for them to go.

When Mary Fuller Frazier died in 1946, she left a lot of her considerable fortune to her hometown of Perryopolis for a library.

"She wanted the community to have access to that library as well," said library president Debora Tidholm.

About 60 years ago, the town and school district agreed to make the library at the high school a public one, and it worked out.

"The school district uses the school during the day, the community library uses the building in the evenings," said Tidholm.

That was the arrangement until a security study of the school came back. Tidholm said it showed the library was an "area of concern" because of some doors that join the library to the school.  

With that in mind, Tidholm said the district told the public library board they were evicted. 

"We had donors who were willing to replace the doors but they refused to meet with us," Tidholm said. 

Tidholm said over the years, the public library board spent thousands on books, and "the trust kicked in $50,000 to purchase furniture for the library when it was remodeled."

KDKA-TV reached out to the district to talk about the move and didn't hear back before the story aired. The public library supporters say things do not look good.

"We can file a lawsuit to stay in the library, we can try to find another location," Tidholm said.

The Friends of the Frazier Community Library said they're still working on a plan but the district told them they have to be out by June 30.