On Coppermill Lane there is a building. It is to the right of Savvas Hair Salon. It would be wrong to say it is empty, because for reasons known only to themselves the council is paying a security company money to protect it 'by occupation', which seems to mean that there is someone from Eastern Europe living on the premises and keeping the public out. The building is the St James's Street Library, or the Coppermill Library, depending on who you talk to. What it actually isn't any more is a library, the council having closed it down some months back, with very little warning or proper consultation.
There has a been a vociferous and acrimonious campaign run since then to have it re-opened. Some people claim it is, or was, the heart of their community. For some people it may have been. For others it wasn't as important as all that, if the council is to be believed, as it is claimed by the council that it was not used or wanted by many residents. Critics point out that the council didn't do much to consult prior to the closure, so have no real evidence for that opinion.
Maybe they went by the number of books taken out. In that case, I must confess I would be one of the people who habitually used it without making my statistical presence felt, as I would go in to browse far more often than I would take a book out. I like to own books I read and enjoy. In fact, I don't think I have ever thrown a book away. I therefore tend to buy books rather than borrow them, though I would certainly use a library to have a leasurely look at something first. There were some books I would never buy but I would check information in, like DIY books and reference manuals.
Those for whom borrowing was a more usual habit, even an essential one, however, did apparently use it and love it, especially many older residents and children. My niece used to like to go and study there, so I know that to be true. Since its closure, many others have come to see how wrong it is that we do not have access to a library now in this part of the borough. The Central Library, if that counts as a proper library still, is a good long walk up the High Street - half an hour when the market is on.
It goes without saying therefore that when local residents had a chance to meet Councillors recently to discuss local facilities, the Library would loom large. Anger is still very much evident, with people demanding the re-opening of our library. Some are reluctant to even discuss spending money on any other means by which access to books can be arranged, for instance through joint use of another building as a mini-library for children and the elderly. Given that many residents of this end of the borough get very little benefit from the council it is easy to see why they would not be assuaged easily. In a borough already starved of cultural outlets, we do not even have those facilities such as other parts of the borough take for granted. Unsurprisingly, the latest meeting did not go well.
Councillors elected to represent the people of this part of the borough have been quite silent on these cultural issues - Labour's Liaquat Ali's affinity with the world of literature and literacy amounts to an uncanny resemblance to McCavity, to whom Johar Khan plays a Cheshire cat's grin.
The third councillor, James O'Rourke has, to be fair, sought to engage with the issues, trying to find a way to get us library access, even if he seems to consider the campaign to re-open the actual library to be doomed. Ideas floated include using a refurbished Scout Hut as a part-time library access point along with some kind of after school scheme and club for the elderly. If the meeting to discuss this hadn't been such a farce I would presumably be able to bring further details of this than can be gleaned from his article on his website (he also seems to be writing most of the material on Mr Khan's) and the local paper.
In the meantime, the good citizens of this part of Walthamstow have reverted to an old tradition. Long before we trusted the council to take responsibility for our local libraries, a trust many of us think they have since betrayed, we didn't have a library. Instead an Association for Self-Improvement was founded in 1840 to form a circulating library and provide lectures. It apparently had 1,000 books in 1855 and 80 members in 1865. A literary institute was founded in 1882. The descendants of these pioneers can now be seen swapping books with each other on the pavement outside St James's Street library from 2.00pm to 4.00pm on the the first Saturday of every month.