Council to consider sale of Central Library downtown building

Published on December 12, 2022

The latest: The City of Fort Worth has a prospective buyer for the downtown property at 500 W. Third St., where the Fort Worth Public Library’s Central Library is currently located.

What’s next: City Council is scheduled to vote on selling the property for $18 million. The vote is scheduled for 6 p.m. Tuesday, Dec. 13, at City Hall, 200 Texas St.

What residents need to know

• Library staff will not be laid off or terminated due to relocation of the library.
• The final location of a future library depends on assessing the needs of the downtown population, residential trends and property availability. Decisions will be guided by a Library Facility Master Plan completed in 2019 that is available online.
• Librarians who specialize in collection management are evaluating all items at the Central Library to determine what can be distributed at the 17 other library branches or set aside for use at a future location.
• The Central Library will remain open until summer 2023.

• People interested in memorial bricks that have been installed outside of the Central Library may provide their name and contact information so they can be put on a contact list.

About the building

The Central Library is a nearly 250,000-square foot, three-story building on more than two acres. The Central Library is not a historic building. The property was built in two phases 44 years ago.

The current site features a second floor that remains unfinished. Since the library reopened to the public after pandemic-related closures in 2020, only the street-level floor is accessible to the public. Visits to the downtown location have decreased 45% since reopening in 2020.

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