Once Again, The Report Is Delayed

The General Services Administration this week added to the delay and uncertainty surrounding the John F. Kennedy Memorial Library by putting off publication of the environmental impact statement indefinitely.

Robert T. Griffin, a GSA special administrator, said Thursday that no report would be issued this month and added he couldn't predict when his department's review would be complete.

C.E. Maguire Inc., a Waltham engineering firm, has been working on preparation of the environmental report since last March, when the GSA awarded the firm a $186,000 contract for the study.

Oliver Brooks, chairman of the Harvard Square Development Task Force, said yesterday that the lack of information coming from the GSA was the result of an anti-community attitude. "They really don't feel we have a right to be heard," Brooks said.

After the completed draft is turned over to the GSA, experts in its Department of Environmental Affairs will edit the report, and then hold closed meetings with Maguire officials to discuss any changes.

At least one developer in Cambridge is confident that the John F. Kennedy Library will be built in Cambridge: Harold J. Kanavos, developer of a new Holiday Inn on Mt. Auburn St. Kanavos has started construction of a nine-story, $8-million inn, though he is still seeking part of the project's financing.

If and when the library is opened and the visitors stream into Cambridge, Kanavos wants to be ready to greet them with a clean bed for the night and, perhaps more importantly under the new environmental regulations, a parking space.