In 1996, the building that housed Redmond’s library was cramped, forcing the library system to relocate the branch a couple blocks away to its current spot.

“That was a very small library,” Todd Dunkelberg, director of Deschutes Public Library system, wrote in an email. “They actually had to shelve some of the collection in the bathrooms there.”

Although visitors to today’s Redmond Public Library won’t find any books in the bathrooms, history is repeating itself 24 years later. The Deschutes Public Library system is looking into expanding Redmond’s library, either by adding on to the existing building or building a new one.

The current building, at 20,200 square feet, is too small to support Redmond’s fast-growing population, Dunkelberg said.

“We see times where we have to turn people away from programs when they don’t fit in the meeting room, or we take programs off-site because they don’t fit here,” he said.

Sonja Brandjes, the Redmond library supervisor, agreed, saying the building doesn’t have enough space for activities and new books.

“I think we are underserving the community at this point,” she said.

The current library building, next door to Redmond City Hall, was built in 1929 as an elementary school and later remodeled in the 1990s for the library, Dunkelberg said. The building is the library system’s second most-visited branch behind the Downtown Bend Public Library, according to library data.

Redmond’s population has grown significantly since the library’s last move. Between 2000 and 2010, the city’s population nearly doubled, adding more than 12,700 residents, according to the Population Research Center at Portland State University. It was the fourth-fastest growing city in Oregon that decade.

The U.S. Census Bureau estimates that Redmond added about 4,700 more residents between 2010 and 2018.

The library system has two options for a bigger Redmond library: build a two-story addition to the existing building, or tear it down and build a new library building.

Because architects won’t present designs to the Deschutes Public Library board until April, there isn’t yet an estimated cost or exact building size for those two options, Dunkelberg said. But either plan would result in a library that’s about 40,000 to 45,000 square feet, according to library data — bigger than the Downtown Bend library, but much smaller than the new branch the system is planning to build on the north end of Bend.

There are pros and cons to both the expansion and new building plans. A new building would fit better on the existing plot of land and have more room for parking, Dunkelberg said. But adding to the existing library would mean tearing down a nearly century-old building. It isn’t clear yet which option will cost more, but that would likely play a factor into the library board’s decision, he said.

In November, the library system will likely ask voters for a bond measure to fund the Bend and Redmond library construction and make upgrades at the rest of the county’s libraries.

Kelly Matthies, a Redmond resident who said her kids are big readers, wasn’t sure which of the two expansion options she preferred. But she said she’d likely vote in favor of a library bond regardless.

“I’d want to see the numbers, but I’m pretty much always for any of the school bonds or library bonds, anything that’s beneficial to the kids or the community,” Matthies said.

Kevin Mann, who’s taking online college courses through the Georgia Institute of Technology, said he frequents the Redmond library to use its Wi-Fi. He said he didn’t think the library was too crowded and that he never votes for any public bond, including for libraries.

“If you know you have an expense coming up, then why don’t you save for that expense?” Mann said.

Patricia Patton, a Redmond resident, said she felt the town’s library could use more space, but she wasn’t sure she understood the need for complete rebuild.

Still, whether the library system plans to build a new library or add onto the existing one, Patton said she’d vote for a bond.

“I think the library is one of the most worthy projects you can invest in in your community,” she said.