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Dunedin city officials have been criticized here in the past for not funding repair and replacement of important community facilities and for failing to think big enough about the city's future needs.
So it is important to give them credit now for rising above that shortcoming.
City officials and residents certainly are thinking big now. On the table are proposed projects to build a new community center in Highlander Park and to reconfigure and update the Dunedin Library.
Conceptual plans for the new community center were unveiled earlier this month, and what a huge improvement it would bring to Highlander Park.
The architect's design shows a two-story, 52,000-square-foot building full of amenities for a growing community: performing arts theater, day care center, exercise room, gymnasium, meeting rooms, more parking, a teen area - even a recording studio.
The city has been seeking public comment this month on the community center proposal. (The public will have one more opportunity, at 7 p.m. Wednesday at the Community Center, 1141 Michigan Blvd.)
Some residents have enthusiastically endorsed these ideas and offered more. Others have criticized the plan as too big and too lavish for Dunedin, or consuming too much green space.
It will be the City Commission's job to right-size the project, fitting it to the available funding and the community's needs. But as they plan for the replacement of the old center that served the city for 30 years, it is important that they remember the new community center must be built for the city's future needs, not its current ones. Vision and a loosening of the purse strings will be required to design and build a community center that still will serve well in 2030.
The second project, a redesign of the public library, was proposed to the commission at its June 15 meeting by the new library director, Anne Shepherd, and a library facilities consultant.
The current Dunedin library was opened brand new in 1996, but since that time there has been an unanticipated explosion of use, especially by children. Shepherd described the conditions in the library as "crowded and chaotic." Also unanticipated when the new library was planned was the skyrocketing use of computers in public libraries. For example, the Dunedin Library has four computers in its youth area, but could easily use 15, Shepherd said.
Shepherd and library supporters are not yet proposing an expansion of the building - though perhaps they should, with the growth in visitors and circulation showing no signs of leveling off - but instead they want a substantial reconfiguring of the interior to take advantage of wasted space.
A teen room would be created, the bookstore enlarged slightly, bookshelves expanded, computers added, a more secure entrance to the children's area built, and the grounds around the library would be improved for the safety and comfort of users.
There might even be a tie-in to the Pinellas Trail so people could walk or bike to the library.
The estimated cost of the project would be $700,000 and it would take about two years to complete, according to the consultant. Shepherd, confronted every day by overcrowded and dysfunctional conditions in the library, wants to expedite the project and finish much more quickly.
City commissioners are waiting for information on possible funding before discussing the project in depth, but just as Dunedin needs a community center for the future, it needs a library that can serve its residents for many years to come. The growth in library use seen in Dunedin is mirrored in other cities in Pinellas and across the country.
These are exciting times in Dunedin as it ends an era when city facilities were allowed to fall into disrepair and enters a time of growth and improvement.