The City of Chelsea says it is preparing a round of building work at the Chelsea Public Library, the 1910 building at 569 Broadway: a new roof and chimney repairs, a new rooftop cooling unit, 32 replacement windows on the main floor, and a rebuilt set of front steps on Broadway. The work is planned in phases from this fall through 2027.
The city announced the plan in a Facebook post on Saturday. It describes four pieces of work for the Department of Public Works:
- Roof: replace the leaking roof and repair the chimney.
- Cooling: install a new rooftop unit, which the city says will improve energy efficiency.
- Windows: replace 32 main-floor windows while keeping their historic appearance.
- Entrance: rebuild the Broadway steps for safety while keeping their original look.
The post does not give a cost for the whole program, name contractors, or say which piece comes first. It says the work will be done “with care to preserve the building’s historic character.”
Where the money has come from so far
The cooling unit has a paper trail in City Council records. In a letter dated February 18, City Manager Fidel Maltez asked the council to move $1.25 million out of an abandoned project, the City Hall attic expansion funded in the fiscal 2024 capital plan, and into public building renovations. His letter set aside $300,000 of that for the library: replacing the rooftop air conditioning unit in the spring and the ductwork later in the year. The letter said the library’s air conditioning had struggled for the past two summers. The rest of the transfer went to a tenant-improvement allowance of $625,000 for a Boys and Girls Club teen center in city-owned space and $300,000 for a women’s locker room at the police station.
The council passed the transfer order on second reading in March. At a March 2 conference on the capital plan, the council’s project list already included roofs at the police station, City Hall and the library, and new windows at City Hall and the library.
The city’s purchasing page lists three bids for the library this year. The rooftop unit went out as IFB 2026-420, with bids due April 30, according to the state’s COMMBUYS listing. The roof replacement went out as IFB 2026-482; the COMMBUYS listing shows it posted May 14, with a site visit May 19 and bids due May 28. The windows at City Hall and the library were put out together, as the city said a single contract and a single mobilization should bring better pricing. That bid was issued a second time as IFB Rebid 2026-237, posted May 21 with a mandatory site visit May 28 and bids due June 18. The city has not published the winning bidders or the contract amounts for any of the three on its website, and Saturday’s post does not include them.
Separately, the council in June approved $200,000 in Community Preservation Act money for the first phase of a library archives project.
The building
The library opened in 1910, two years after the fire of April 1908 destroyed the city’s earlier Fitz Public Library along with most of downtown. The city’s post calls it a historic building that has served the community for more than a century, and it frames the work as a way to keep it in service “for generations to come.”
The announcement lands in the same week the library opened a community needs survey asking residents what they want from its programs, spaces and services. The survey has no closing date yet.
The city has not said whether any part of the library will close during the work. Hours and program schedules are posted at the library and on the city’s website.