A resident of Bloomfield Hills, Michigan, has lost an appeal to the state Supreme Court of his claim that Michigan public libraries must sell nonresidents library cards on request. The July 26 decision ended plaintiff George Goldstone’s quest to regain borrowing privileges at the Bloomfield Township Public Library, which ceased offering those services to Bloomfield Hills residents in 2003 after the municipality declined to renew a 39-year contract with BTPL by rejecting a proposed $187,550 fee increase.
The library board responded by voting to end nonresident services and, when Goldstone offered to purchase a library card for his family for $54 in 2004, officials refused since at that time Bloomfield Township residents paid more than $400 in taxes per household, according to the Q&A document posted on the library’s website.
The Michigan Supreme Court ruled 4–3 that the state constitution gives each public library the right to determine its loan policies, and “does not require each and every individual public library facility in Michigan to offer nonresident book borrowing privileges,” Justice Stephen J. Markman wrote. The decision also noted that since various state laws give municipalities without public libraries the right to decide whether to contract for services with other communities that fund a local library, the state legislature has turned the constitutional provision for the “establishment and support of public libraries” into a local-government decision.
Describing the decision as “a huge victory for the library community,” Michigan Library Association Executive Director Gretchen Couraud told American Libraries that librarians there had to approach this court case from a bottom-line perspective because “we are funded right now 95% with local funds.” Emphasizing that Michigan libraries “want our libraries to be open and accessible,” Couraud cited MLA’s amicus brief argument for BTPL that “by guaranteeing funding, you make them even more open and accessible.”
Posted July 27, 2007.