Multnomah Offers to Return $20,000
to Donors
After netting $20,000 in donations for Multnomah County libraries in Oregon, the library’s foundation has apologized and offered to refund the 333 donations it received in response to a letter that inadvertently contained outdated financial information, the Portland Oregonian reported May 29.
In mid-April, the foundation sent out 32,000 letters citing 1996-97 figures that only $4.98 per resident was spent on books. However, in 1997 voters approved a $113.3-million levy that increased the budget from $24 million to $37.8 million and nearly doubled the book-buying amount to $9.12 per resident. Comparing it to other library systems, the newspaper reported that Multnomah is one of the wealthiest of its size in the nation.
Director Ginnie Cooper admitted that she supplied the old data to the foundation, saying she used the only numbers that were available. “It didn’t jump out at me that it was wrong because we haven’t recalculated the figures.”
Posted June 7, 1999.
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