Residents Rally to Save Bowling Green Branch
Some two-dozen concerned residents gathered June 25 to discuss ways to save Bowling Green (Ky.) Public Library’s Smiths Grove branch. The library board of directors voted June 18 to close the branch as of September 1, as well as to eliminate Sunday hours systemwide beginning July 1, after losing 50%—$150,000—of the library’s county funding.
“We all here obviously want this to be kept open,” Smiths Grove resident Angie Conrad said in the June 26 Bowling Green Daily News. “We’re going to be the squeaky wheel; we just need to know who to squeak to.”
The meeting was attended by Warren County District 4 Magistrate Tommy Hunt, and Judge-Executive Mike Buchanon, and Smiths Grove Mayor Steve Watt—the latter two summoned by attendees after the meeting began, the Bowling Green Daily News reported June 26. Buchanon suggested that the residents take their concerns to library board Chair Jim Johnson, since only the board has the authority to open or close branches.
Buchanon said three recently enacted taxes for the health department, soil conservation district, and county extension office should free up enough funds to allow magistrates to redirect an additional $150,000 to the library after January 1. “We hope to get it back to the level where it was by the end of the year . . . but we’re not sure that would be satisfactory to [the library],” he said.
BGPL has long sought a library taxing district, seeing a dedicated tax as the best prospect for stable funding. But Director Alisa Carmichael said that when the issue was brought up about a decade ago, it was “a very bitter experience for everybody involved.” She told the Daily News that the library’s petition drive was met by a campaign of misinformation, and library staff and trustees found themselves spending most of their time correcting it.
Asked at the meeting whether he’d support a library tax, Buchanon declined to comment. Watt also would not commit to supporting a tax. “I don’t think you understand—we have no power over fiscal court, the city of Smiths Grove,” Watt maintained. Hunt said he would back the people who put him in office. “I’ll support the people of the Fourth District,” he said. “If they want a library tax, I’ll be glad to support it.”
Posted on June 29, 2007.
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