On the eve of our great decision, whether to build a new library here in West Hempstead, the debate arises anew - and we welcome it. We ponder the costs attendant to building and maintaining a state of the art facility. We question the location of the designated site. And we ask whether the risk of this bold initiative is worth taking. Let's keep that debate going. Let all

voices be heard.

Yes, it costs a lot to build and maintain a library. Too much, in fact. It

also costs $35 million a year to run our schools. Too much, indeed. Does that mean we don't spend the money needed to fund our children's education? Of course not. We pay, reluctantly, the high cost for that which is not a luxury but, by any reasonable measure, a necessity. We fund our schools. And we build new libraries. There really is no option. The price tag associated with knowledge, held up against the cost of ignorance, is an absolute bargain!

When you think about it, what is the cost of doing the spectacular, of doing what is necessary, for the status of our community, and for the future of our children, versus the cost of doing nothing? What is the cost of breathing new life into a potentially thriving center of residential, retail and public use, versus the cost of erecting a tombstone, in the form of a storage facility, which dooms not only this parcel, but also the surrounding area, to 50 years of eerie silence? What price can be put on the value of knowledge, of educating a child, on the benefits a library of the information age will invariably yield for our town?

We must, of course, recognize the added burden of funding a bond initiative, particularly upon our seniors, and those on fixed incomes. We are asked to pay more for our schools, to pay more for our bridges and roadways, and to pay more for the necessities of everyday life. Still, we must be willing to bear the burden of building knowledge and stability, for the library is, indeed, our bridge to tomorrow. Without that library - that interactive link of past, present and future - we forsake our obligations, not only to the next generation, but to ourselves as well. This, I submit, would be the greater, and more unbearable burden.

And what of location? Is the designated site not part and parcel of our community - of our West Hempstead? What better place to build a library than on that highly visible plain, encountered by so many, and sloughed off as "wasteland?" People look at the site as it is today, in all of its disgrace, and say, "This is West Hempstead." Why not look at this site as it can be - as it must be - a library, and not a dumping ground; a senior residence, and not a no-tell motel; a railroad station and facilities befitting a first class community, and not a literal hole in the wall - and say, this is West Hempstead? Truth is, as the dust settles and the rhetoric ends its flight,

there is no other place and, in my opinion, no better place, to build our new library, and to lay that cornerstone.

In building libraries, we commit to the kind of tomorrow that opens doors of opportunity, for our children, for those who look for the best place to raise a family, and for you and me. By saying YES, we reaffirm our faith in

community, assure our place as hometown, not ghost town, and set the stage for all of those magnificent flights of fancy we only now are beginning to envision, and dare to dream. The greatest risk lies not in taking that step forward, but rather, in standing still.

Seth D. Bykofsky

(The writer is President of the West Hempstead Civic Association.)