Renton Police are continuing to look for the two apparently transient young men who broke into the downtown Renton Library early Wednesday morning, ransacking the library’s office and raiding the refrigerator in the staff lounge.

(This report clarifies some of the initial reporting in the Renton Reporter.)

A computer monitor taken from the library’s work area was found tossed into the Cedar River from the pedestrian bridge next to Houser Way. “It’s a useless waste,” said library Director Bette Anderson.

The breakin was captured on the library’s outside security camera, showing the two men breaking out the glass on the side door to the library next to the parking lot. The library doesn’t have an alarm system.

Police have identified one of the teens, an 18-year-old Renton man, but it’s thought he may have left the state, according to Renton Police Sgt. Tracy Merrill. Renton Police have enough evidence to arrest him for investigation of burglary, according to Merrill.

Renton Police were expecting to submit a felony case against the man on Thursday (July 2) with King County prosecutors.

The 18-year-old is shown on the security tape throwing a rock through the door’s bottom glass, then kicking it in. He takes off a large backpack and crawls into the library, followed by the second suspect. They emerge later and carry off what appears to be bins of food from the refrigerator. Some of the bins were still missing Friday.

Police have a brief description of the second suspect, based on images from the security camera. His age and identity aren’t yet known. He is described as a white teen, with a small to medium build. He was wearing what appeared to be a white hooded sweatshirt.

Anyone with information about these two suspects is asked to call 911.

The early morning breakin was part of a wave of vandalism around the library and Liberty Park early Wednesday morning.

The windows and windshield on a City of Renton car parked next to the library were broken, although it’s not known for sure whether the library vandals did that damage.

The station wagon, used by the library to transport books and people and valued at about $2,600, is considered a total loss. The city has given the library a temporary replacement car.

At Liberty Park, some trees were pushed over and hacked with something. Some sprinkler heads were kicked off, but the water wasn’t turned on. City workers were able to right the trees and fix the damage.

The total loss to the city is estimated at about $3,600, including the car, about $400 to replace the glass in the library door and about $500 in labor to clean up and repair the damage done by the vandals.

The vandalism at about 2:30 a.m. Wednesday morning left Mayor Denis Law angry and frustrated.

“It’s disgusting when you have people who like to do this type of property damage,” Law said Wednesday morning. “They are purely having fun at the public’s expense.”

Two other vehicles in the parking lot on Mill Avenue were damaged early Wednesday morning, including a light pickup from which electronic equipment was stolen.

Two men, 26 and 28 years old, were arrested for possession of stolen property, according to Merrill. Whether charges will be filed against the two is in doubt because it may be difficult to prove who actually had possession of the stolen property, he said.

One suspect was found under the library and the other under the bridge on Houser Way.

The common areas of the library weren’t touched during the breakin. But it was upsetting to library workers and nearly threatened to delay the day’s opening of the library.

Wednesday morning was “particularly difficult,” said Anderson, the library director. “Everyone was upset,” she said.

Staff couldn’t clean up the mess right away because police were still conducting their investigation, she said. She cleaned the refrigerator. “It’s spotless now,” Anderson said.

To her knowledge, “this is the first time we have had this level of destruction,” she said. Windows have been broken before; a library’s loss is “more subtle,” she said, such as someone not returning checked-out material.

The temporary replacement car for the library is a sedan. The sedan “works” to haul books, just not as well as the station wagon, Anderson said.

Small transient encampments continue to be a problem in the area around the former 200 Mill Avenue Building and the downtown library, including under the concrete stairwell leading down to the garden area between the two city-owned buildings.

The area under the library is either fenced or difficult to access and is posted no-trespassing.

The breakin at the library has prompted a closer look by the city at how it will address those camps.

“We will have to look at issuing citations,” said Mayor Law.

The break-in was discovered by library workers arriving at about 7 a.m. Police spent several hours interviewing about a dozen transients found under the two bridges, collecting evidence and documenting the damage to the library and the vehicles in the parking lot.

Inside the library, food had been dumped from the refrigerator, DVDs littered the back room, and the computer monitor was missing.

“This is not what you want to wake up to,” Aaron Oesting said outside the library Wednesday morning. Oesting is assistant director of Renton Public Library.

Oesting received a phone call early Wednesday morning from Anderson, the library’s director, informing him of the vandalism.

Oesting said Anderson told him vandals had “broken into the library, a library car had been smashed and they made a mess of the staff room.”

Library technical assistant Janice Bicknell was the first employee to see the damage.

She walked through the library with Renton Police at about 7:45 a.m.

“My first thought as I pulled in and saw the police car was I was hoping no one was hurt,” she said.

In her 20 years with the library, Bicknell had never seen anything like Wednesday’s vandalism. Still, she said she was glad the damage was confined to the staff room and the work room, and that no books were damaged.

“It was not as bad as it could be,” she said.

Oesting recalls another instance of library vandalism back in 2002, when a rock was thrown through a window — while employees were inside.

But that incident was not nearly as severe as Wednesday’s damage.

“I don’t understand it,” Oesting said. “I don’t know why people would target a library.”

Oesting especially doesn’t understand why people would vandalize the library during these strained economic times, when the library is heavily used.

“They’re not just hurting the library, they’re hurting other people,” he said.

Despite the damage, the library was open at 10 a.m. — its usual time.

About an hour before opening time, the employees stepped one by one over the broken glass, yogurt cups, bottled water and soda cans, and into the library.

Jessica Marie prepared for the first summer session of Story Time, and the other employees readied for their shifts.

The group of employees that gathered outside the library early Wednesday said the vandalism didn’t make them nervous to continue working in the building, but one employee said she would no longer leave her car in the parking lot overnight.

Law wonders why if the group was hungry did they throw food on the ground.

“They are not there because they are hungry,” he said.

Now, the taxpayers will have the bill to fix the damage.

Such action isn’t typical of all homeless people, he said.

“It’s not someone down on their luck,” he said. “It’s criminals.”