Angela Mazzie, a deputy for County Supervisor Michael Antonovich, said in the June 28 Los Angeles Times that residents had flooded his office with support for the library system. “The libraries are very important in the community,” she said, “for children all the way up to the seniors.”
Laura Cokolat, children’s librarian at the La Crescenta branch, which would have had its hours cut from 40 to 30 per week, told the Times, “Overcrowding is already a problem as it is.” But having the funding restored “gives us the opportunity to give the community the services the community needs from us.”
However, state funding for all libraries in California remains uncertain as legislators face partisan gridlock in fixing a $40-billion budget shortfall and addressing Gov. Gray Davis’s call to cut library support in half. In a worst-case scenario, the California State Library in Sacramento may have to cut 30 staff positions, according to the July 3 Ventura County Star. Sen. Jack Scott (D-Altadena) said, “I happen to be a big library proponent, but the state is facing an impossible task, and the library will have to sustain some cuts.”
Posted July 3, 2003.