"It has been well taken care of and is ready to become a retail and commercial destination again." Library Director Michelle Mears said that about the old Belt Branch, as reported by News-Press NOW this spring. The word "again" carries the story. For decades, the library most east-side households used was in a building that had never been meant to be one.
Rolling Hills Library's new Riverside Branch at 400 Mosaic Court changed that. KQ2 placed it at the south end of Mosaic Court. The branch opened quietly on April 20. The St. Joseph Chamber of Commerce held its ribbon cutting on May 7, and the library held its grand opening on May 9, 2026. Five months later, many people on the east side still picture the library as the storefront on the Belt. A building designed for a library can do things a converted strip mall never could, and those things now shape how a library card fits into a normal week in Greystone.
A Library That Started Life as a Strip Mall
The Rolling Hills Library building project page gives the history plainly. The old building on N. Belt Highway "was designed as a commercial strip mall with space underneath for a construction business and residence." The library rented half of the basement until 2003, when it bought and renovated the whole building. In recent years, the street-facing units upstairs had no tenants, so the library used them for meeting rooms, administration and the Friends of the Library bookstore, Books Revisited.
So the meeting rooms were in former storefronts and the bookstore sat in a former retail bay. Everything was fitted into space built for something else. The new branch starts from the other direction.
| Former Belt Branch | Riverside Branch | |
|---|---|---|
| Original purpose | Commercial strip mall with a lower-level business and residence | Built as a library |
| Building size | Not reported | 36,000 square feet on four acres |
| Meeting space | Rooms set up in former upstairs storefronts | Rooms from one-on-one size up to a room for 300 |
| Study rooms | Baseline | Twice as many |
| Books Revisited | Upstairs retail unit | Inside the branch, near the front doors |
| Pickup without going inside | Not reported | Drive-up window for holds, printing and copies |
The Riverside Branch is now the district's largest location. It also houses the library's administration offices and the office and garage for the Bookmobile. Sapp Design Architects of Kansas City designed it, and J.E. Dunn Construction managed construction. Early News-Press NOW coverage estimated the facility at about $18 million, paid for with reserves and bond funding. According to the grand-opening coverage, the finished cost, land included, came in 10 percent under the maximum budget the library board had set.
The Errand That Got Shorter
The feature that most changes a weekday is the drive-up window. Kelly Morris of Rolling Hills Library told the Rotary Club of St. Joseph that it handles holds pickup, printing and copies. News-Press NOW reported that she described it as useful for patrons with mobility difficulties and for parents who don't want to unbuckle several small children just to pick up a stack of books. "I think it's going to be really popular," she said.
Hours make the window more practical still. For the week of October 12, the Riverside Branch is listed as open Monday through Saturday from 9 a.m. to 8 p.m. and Sunday from noon to 6 p.m. With those evening hours, you can place a hold online at lunch and pick it up through the window on the way home from work.
Rooms Sized From Two People to 300
The second change is space. Morris described meeting areas at several sizes. There are rooms for one-on-ones and small groups, medium conference rooms, and one room that holds up to 300 people. The library also doubled its number of study rooms. News-Press NOW summed it up this way: "there are even more free spaces available to the public."
Some rooms are built for specific uses. Tech Central is set up for one-on-one computer help and small-group classes. A larger creative room is meant for craft programs and possibly cooking classes. On the library's events calendar, CreateSpace is the room where craft and STEM programs take place. In the children's area, an interactive wall has hands-on, literacy-based activities. Its large square panels can be swapped out so the wall changes over time.
The Path Out Back
For a subdivision known for its ponds and walking space, one detail stands out. A retention pond sits behind the library with a paved walking path around it. Morris said she has seen people biking on it. There's also a small outdoor patio with chairs. Morris said fish may be added to the pond, and if that happens the library plans to lend fishing poles. Those loans were described as a future plan. Ask at the desk before bringing a tackle box.
No source we found connects the path to a wider trail network. It's a short loop beside a library on four acres. Still, a story time can end with a walk around a pond, and the old strip-mall parking lot never offered that.
This Fall at Riverside
The programs below come from the Rolling Hills Library calendars for October and November. Library calendars change, so check registration and times on rhcl.org before you go.
- Frankensporks, Wednesday, October 14
- Perler Beads, Halloween edition, Wednesday, October 21
- Make a Ghost!, Friday, October 23
- Uncle Fester's Costume Closet, Saturday through Monday, October 24 to 26, with a Saturday session from 2 to 4 p.m.
- Dog Man Afternoon, Monday, November 2
- Earring Making, Wednesday, November 4
- Tidy for the Holidays, Sparking Joy in Your Home, Thursday, November 12
The costume closet comes just before Halloween weekend, which makes it the most useful listing on the calendar for families with kids. The November tidying talk works on a similar schedule, landing a couple of weeks before Thanksgiving guests arrive.
Books Revisited, run by the Friends of the Library, is now inside the branch with its own hours. Its posted hours are Monday from noon to 5 p.m., Tuesday through Friday from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., and Saturday from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. The Friends group is a nonprofit that provides financial support to Rolling Hills, so a used-book purchase there goes back to the library.
Which Card Works Where
East-side residents often aren't sure whether they belong to Rolling Hills or the St. Joseph Public Library. Rolling Hills says its district boundary follows St. Joseph's 1965 city limits, not today's. On its levy information page, the library describes the two systems as separate districts. One is primarily city and the other mainly county, and neither charges the other's residents out-of-district fees. A long-standing agreement lets residents of either district get a card from the other at no charge, and Rolling Hills says "that will not change."
In practice, an address on either side of that 1965 line can use the Riverside Branch with a free card.
What Happens to the Old Building
The former Belt Branch, in the Rolling Hills Plaza strip mall, was listed for sale at the time of the grand opening. Before the move, the library held surplus moving sales, including a third sale on January 30 and 31 in the former PepperJax Grill space next door. We haven't found any report of a completed sale. For now, the building is waiting to become the kind of retail space it was built to be.
A new public building nearby is one of the things that quietly shapes how a part of town works day to day. If you're in Greystone and wondering how changes on the east side are showing up in what homes are worth, Coder Haggard Lehr Real Estate Group can walk you through it. Get Your Instant Home Valuation and see where your Greystone home stands this fall.
