The juxtaposition of fine old homes and beat-up vacant dwellings on what McKeesport residents call The Hill is nowhere so stark as it is around the Carnegie Library of McKeesport.

Catty-cornered from the newly cleaned sand-blasted castle-like stone library, for example, a century-old red brick church stands boarded up and graffiti-tagged, awaiting a congregation.

Likewise, the library is seeing the good and the bad at the same time. Extensive renovations there are mixed with a drastic reduction in funding from the city and state.

Library Director Jo Ellen Kenney told city council recently that reduction of the city's annual library contribution from $60,000 to $30,000 would have devastating consequences for the library.

"Our concern is that if we have a cut in any local money, we are penalized by the state. Our state aid is based on local government funding," she said. "The city [allocation] is one-tenth of the library's budget."

But a library must maintain its current level of local funding to retain the current level of state funding, she said.

With 75,000 patrons last year and 20,000 computer users on the facility's 38 computers, the library is well-used.

Yet its local funding is far less, at $2.50 per capita, than the smaller and less grand Wilkinsburg Library, which receives $9 per capita, Kenney told council.

Somber as that news was, she wore a smile and proud spirit as walked Friday through the main desk area of the soon-to-be fully renovated first floor of the library.

A painter on a ladder finished up the paint job on the plaster molding around the stained glass dome above the restored oak circulation desk.

The green hue of antique stained glass, original to the building, hadn't been seen since World War I or World War II when the dome was plastered over in the time of air raids.

But when the old plaster was removed and the dome was uncovered recently, only seven small panes of glass had to be replaced, Kenney said.

The main floor's walls and ceilings were replastered and repainted in their original green and white, said Michael Abraitis, president of the library's board of directors.

Jeff Goughler, owner of Artist At Work, the painting company contracted to do the painting work, said the tall columns in the 18-foot-high rooms of the first floor are being painted with a faux marble look.

Although his company specializes in new construction, his crew also does a fair amount of historic work, he said, adding that being "part of history" is his favorite part of the job.

The recent renovations are the legacy of the late Mildred Boycott, a McKeesport native who bequeathed the library the funds for the work.

The renovations include installation of 38 half-dome brass period-style light fixtures on the first floor, replacing inefficient fluorescent lights.

A new 20-foot desk, matching the oak circulation desk, was installed to hold computers. The circulation desk was capped with a new polished granite top.

"This is just a fun building," Kenney said. "And we were able to make it through the lean 1980s when other Carnegie [libraries] like Braddock and Homestead were closing off parts of their buildings."

But lean times could again be around the corner, library officials fear. The loss of half of the city's funding of the library, coupled with the loss of $125,000 of the state's annual $250,000 contribution, leaves the facility seriously in the hole.

The McKeesport library has a $600,000 annual budget that will be pared by one-quarter with trimming of state and local funding.

Although Abraitis expressed confidence that library officials could make up the shortfall for next year, the ripple effect of that loss in funding won't really be felt for two years, he cautioned.

"Two years down the road, we'll lose state funding," he said.