By Scott Taylor,Staff Writer

AUBURN – Midway through renovation, Auburn’s downtown library isn’t much to look at, according to city officials.

“They’re still buttoning up parts of it, but they should have it all enclosed by November,” said Library Director Rosemary Waltos. “Right now, it’s mostly big rooms with metal studs.”

Auburn city councilors will get a tour of the building led by Waltos at 5 p.m. today, before their evening meeting.

Renovations on the library began in June 2004. After Auburn’s municipal offices moved out of the old city building next to the library in October 2004, crews knocked that building down and began work on the $7 million expansion. When work wraps up next spring, the library will feature a larger children’s section, a separate area for young adult books, computer classrooms and community meeting rooms.

Councilors will have to use their imagination to see any of that Monday.

“It’s mostly just studs, at this point, that show where the walls and the rooms are going to go,” Waltos said. “It gives you a sense of adjacency, of how things are going to be arranged.”

Crews are working mainly in the new section now, which runs along Court Street.

Planning for the expansion began in 1998, with volunteers raising about half the money for it through donations and grants. The city took on about $3.5 million in debt to pay for the rest of the work.

Meanwhile, until the renovations are completed, the library is in operation at the Auburn Mall. More information is available at www.aub.lib.me.us/