Hurricane Milton Damage Forces Flagler Beach Public Library, a City Treasure, to Close Until Further Notice

Hurricane Milton’s rains caused some damage at the Flagler Beach Library, requiring services to be limited to curbsides, with even those services now suspended. A reopening date is not yet certain, but is probable later this month.

“We had water intrusion on the floors along the East and North walls of the Library.  It didn’t rise enough to damage any materials,” Melissa Parish wrote in an email. “The remediation company treated the carpet and set up equipment to dry it all out.  They also removed some pieces of moulding to take a look at the drywall.”

That was on Thursday. The workers returned on Friday to move shelves and assess walls behind them and judge whether drywall has to be replaced. Today, it appeared conditions of the walls were better than feared. But the repairs required tenting portions of the library, which made continuing curbside, copy and scan service iffy.




“The contents of the shelves have been boxed and moved to our Reading Room, and at this time I’m not sure how much access we’ll have to the collection while they’re working,” Parish said. “I thought it advisable to suspend operations temporarily while the [construction] company is in the building.  That said, we’ve been able to get some books checked out for folks who call or come by while we’re awaiting the company’s arrival and will continue to do so as we’re able.”

Curbside pick-up was suspended today to avoid being in the way of workers.

The library will update work progress on the city’s website.  “As we learn more, we should have an idea of how long the closure may last, and what services we’ll be able to provide as the work is going on,” Parish said. “We will be updating the City website and Facebook pages as well as the voicemail at the Library as we go along.  We plan to reopen as soon as we possibly can.

The Flagler Beach library, which operates with complete independence from the Flagler County library system, suffered significant damage after Hurricane Irma in 2017, and has had water intrusion–or flooding, to not use a euphemism–along the north and east walls before, but never enough to threaten the collection.

The library is a unique city treasure, “a unique representation of libraries of old and of old Flagler Beach itself,” in Parish’s words, having begun as a set of shelves in the corner of the  still-very-active Flagler Woman’s Club. The books outgrew the corner and the club, and eventually demanded their own library, which these days sits at 315 South 7^th Street. “It’s a cool place. We love our community, and strive to take care of them, so we’ll do as much as we can as we’re able,” Parish said.