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Recession, 2003: More Cutbacks and Closures

The fiscal year ended June 30 for most states, and all of them except Vermont have laws that require a balanced budget, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. Many states were scrambling up to the last minute (and in California’s case, way past) to make ends meet after a year of declining revenues.

Even with the upcoming $10 billion in federal relief payments under the Jobs and Growth Tax Relief Reconciliation Act signed into law May 28 by President Bush, states cut $14.5 billion this year to cover shortfalls—the largest correction in the 27 years that governors have been tracking them, USA Today reported June 26.

These state woes are trickling down to the local level where, as ALA Immediate Past President Maurice Freedman’s Campaign to Save America’s Libraries has been reminding us, libraries are facing the deepest cuts in their history. County, city, and community libraries are threatening to shut branches, shorten hours, freeze staff positions, and cut back on services at a time when circulation statistics are up (AL, Aug. 2002, p. 62–63).

Here is a sampling of budget crunches, gathered from online news sources and other reports:

ALASKA. The Kenai Community Library is now closed on Sundays because the city’s 2004 deficit budget forced it to drop one part-time staff position. Director Ewa Jankowska said that the remaining staff would be working harder, even though the library’s book budget has also been slashed from $28,000 to $8,000.

ARIZONA. After the Tucson city council rejected a plan June 16 to curtail summer hours because of staff vacancies and a $43-million shortfall in city revenues, officials at Tucson-Pima Public Library opted for service reductions. Deputy Director Betsy Stunz-Hall said computer-instruction classes and the summer storytime program would be canceled, public-service desks would be minimally staffed, and managers would oversee more than one branch. She added it was unlikely that the system would return to previous staffing levels.

CALIFORNIA. Facing partisan gridlock as late as mid-July in fixing a record shortfall of $40 billion, the state legislature grappled with many crucial elements in Gov. Gray Davis’s proposed budget, including a 50% reduction in state support to public libraries—down from $52 million to $22 million. In a worst-case scenario, the California State Library in Sacramento would have to cut 30 staff positions. Sen. Jack Scott (D-Altadena) said in the July 3 Ventura County Star, “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.”

The state’s uncertainty has fueled the anxiety felt by counties that will get smaller checks from Sacramento this year. “We’ve been making the library work with state money and now that the state money has disappeared, we’re in trouble,” Tehama County Librarian Ray Schroff told his board in July. “The only way we’ll be able to survive is through the Friends of the Library groups.”

Car dealers at the Ventura Auto Center found out that the Ventura County Library would have to cut its hours and close a busy homework center because of state funding cuts. Within hours they contacted Library Director Starrett Kreissman and paid the entire city shortfall of $67,000. Bob Gregory, president of Paradise Chevrolet, said, “If our donation can help one more child get a better education, then it will be worth it.”

Library hours for the Fillmore branch of the Ventura County Library could drop from 24 hours weekly to eight or even none at all, depending on state funding. The city can’t chip in because it’s already dipping into reserves to offset a projected loss of car-license fees.

San Bernardino County Librarian Ed Kieczykowski has increased overdue fines for the first time in nearly 20 years and proposed cutting each branch’s operating hours by eight. Fourteen residents of Tulare County banded together to convince the county board to abandon its plan to close the three smallest library branches. Their alternative plan cuts hours at all the branches and ends bookmobile service, a solution that spreads the pain countywide instead of just to rural areas.

The San Diego city council came up with extra funds June 24 to keep one library branch open on Sunday in each of the eight council districts, despite a citywide shortfall of $30 million. The original plan, approved May 12, would have required 21 of the 33 branches to cut Sunday hours.

The Los Angeles County board of supervisors June 23 restored $7.3 million to its library budget for 2003–2004, rescuing 15 county branches from closing and avoiding cuts in operating hours (AL, June/July, p. 26). Angela Mazzie, a deputy for County Supervisor Michael Antonovich, said in the June 28 Los Angeles Times that residents had flooded the office with support for the library system. However, the supervisors gave notice to 40 cities that they must put county-library funding on a city ballot by June 2004 or face a possible loss of library services.

The positions of 26 school media specialists in the San Jose Unified School District were cut after the June 3 defeat of a $6-million parcel-tax measure designed to maintain existing services. All but two were reassigned as classroom teachers. When school resumes in the fall, most of the district’s libraries will be staffed by technicians, except for the Hacienda Elementary School, where Dayle Moore got to keep her job thanks to parents who raised $52,000 to pay her salary. The cuts were due in part to an $11.6-million reduction in state aid to school libraries that Gov. Davis signed into law in March (AL, May, p. 18).

Oakland Public Library decided to deal with reduced book funds by posting a wish list on Amazon.com. By late June, the library’s request resulted in more than 600 volumes of reading material donated from as far away as Tokyo and Paris.

Burlingame Public Library also uploaded a wish list and has collected some 420 donated books.

COLORADO. Although partial funding was restored to the state regional library systems (AL, June/July, p. 24), two of them—Pathfinder in Grand Junction and Three Rivers in Glenwood Springs—had to close by August 1. Kathleen Noland, executive director of the Colorado Association of Libraries, told American Libraries that the remaining five must compete for the $600,000 available. Plans for the systems to work together, merge, or operate part-time are still in development.

The downtown Denver Public Library began closing Wednesdays July 2 in an effort to reduce its budget 11%, as directed by Mayor Wellington Webb. The measure is one of several approved May 15 to cope with a 7%, or $3.5 million, budget reduction brought about by declining sales taxes and other city and county revenues. All branches have reduced hours, the materials budget is down by 9%, and vacancies are not being filled. At the beginning of next year, commissioners will evaluate whether the staff attrition approach is working or whether layoffs and furloughs are necessary.

FLORIDA. Public libraries in Polk County opposed a threatened $2-million cut to their funding in mid-July by handing out special bookmarks encouraging residents to contact county commissioners. Library Cooperative Coordinator Gladys Roberts said the loss would mean hours, staff, services, and materials would have to be slashed.

The South Florida Water Management District backpedaled on its June cost-cutting proposal to shut down its 54-year-old reference center in West Palm Beach after employees who used it frequently protested. Water managers said they would keep the documents collection intact and install compact shelving instead to regain space.

ILLINOIS. The University of Illinois at Champaign-Urbana closed its browsing room in the Illini Union building June 13 in anticipation of a tight budget next year, despite a 5% tuition increase. The collection will eventually make its way to the Undergraduate Library after it’s remodeled. “It always pains librarians to have to close any sort of service point,” University Librarian Paula Kaufman told the Daily Illini.

MASSACHUSETTS. Although proposed state aid to public libraries for 2004 was only reduced by about $500,000 from previous levels, Gov. Mitt Romney in June cut $1.05 million from regional library aid and zeroed out a $341,000 library-technology fund and a $319,000 talking-book program at the Worcester Public Library. However, David L. Gray, communications director for the Massachusetts Board of Library Commissioners, told AL that funding for these programs had been unanimously restored by the House in mid-July and the Senate was expected to concur. Funding for the MBLC was cut by $100,000, but the state deferred a restructuring of its education department that would have merged the board with a new executive office (AL, Apr., p. 20).

State cuts have prompted the Boston Public Library to reduce Sunday hours and release about 100 employees, so in March trustees doubled overdue fees from five to 10 cents a day in order to increase operating funds. In 2002, the library collected some $150,000 in fees. BPL’s main library on Copley Square opened two new restaurants in May and a month later launched online sales of historical reprints.

The town of Franklin debated closing its venerable library, founded in 1790 with a donation of books from Benjamin Franklin, but after it became clearer that state funding would be adequate, the facility won a reprieve. Over the past two years the town has laid off 46 full-time employees—23% of its total personnel—and in March it cut the library’s hours to four days a week. To the cheers of residents at a May 1 budget hearing, Town Administrator Jeffrey Nutting promised $60,000 for the library in the coming year.

MINNESOTA. After three hours of discussion, the Minneapolis Public Library board July 9 agreed on a preliminary budget that spares branches from closing but eliminates up to 80 full-time staff positions and drastically reduces hours across the system. MPL faces a 20% reduction in operating funds in 2004 and has already been hit with a 10% cut in 2003 that forced it to contemplate closing branches and canceling construction of a new downtown library facility, although these options were rejected (AL, June/July, p. 26–28). The board canceled funding for the homework-helper and summer-reading programs in order to keep all branches open at least some hours. No branches are open Sundays, including the temporary Central Library, which has cut weekly hours from 53 to 40.

St. Paul Public Library will have an easier time raising funds now that it has become a separate agency (AL, June/July, p. 28), but its current budget includes a loss of $100,000 for materials.

Ramsey County had to close one branch library June 1 and another is expected to shut down in January, with no replacement facilities in the works. To help offset an 8% reduction over two years in the county’s portion of the library budget, the Roseville branch will open a store in September expected to bring in $10,000 in profits the first year from selling merchandise that features library mascot Booker, a floppy-eared white puppy.

Dakota County is planning for $825,000 in library cuts in 2004, while Hennepin County is looking at a worst-case scenario of a $1.97-million reduction—a 5% decrease from the 2003 level, reduced midyear by $500,000 when some state funding evaporated. Five FTE positions at Hennepin were cut through attrition.

MISSOURI. Kansas City School Superintendent Bernard Taylor Jr. asked the board of education in June to drop 24 of the district’s 70 school librarian positions after it rejected his proposal to close a teen-parent counseling center. But librarians wrote and telephoned board members, who reversed their decision two weeks later and voted to dip further into a reserve fund to maintain them. “They did the right thing for the kids,” said Swinney Elementary School librarian Judy Clause.

NEBRASKA. Patrons turned out for a July 13 rally in favor of stopping Omaha Public Library’s Swanson branch from temporarily closing. The library board needs to cut $1 million from the 2004 budget, and shutting the branch for one year would take care of half of that. If the proposal succeeds, Swanson would close in January.

NEW YORK. The New York legislature May 15 restored $13.3 million for 742 public libraries that Gov. George Pataki had cut the day before in one of 119 vetoes on a state spending plan he called “irresponsible.” The two houses had not overturned a governor’s budget veto since 1982. “The library community in New York was marvelous,” New York Library Association Executive Director Susan Lehman Keitel told AL, persuading lawmakers to reinstate the entire funding, “the only area where the entire cut was restored.”

Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg relented June 4 on some of his least popular proposals to balance the New York City budget, including a $7.6-million cut to the city’s three library systems (AL, May, p. 16). The loss would have forced many branches to reduce service hours from five days a week to four.

OHIO. State library support took a lesser hit than expected, with the fund frozen at the 2003 level of about $453 million. Proposals earlier in the budget cycle had called for eliminating it entirely (AL, May, p. 14). Lynda Murray, government relations director for the Ohio Library Council, said the fund was dependent on the state income tax; poor collections over the next year could mean further cuts for 2005.

Libraries had already scaled back in anticipation. When Richland County closed its main library on Sundays and reduced Friday hours at seven branches, 18 employees were laid off and 12 others reassigned.

The Greentown branch of the North Canton Public Library closed July 1 after a one-year reprieve from the budget ax. The “little library in the cornfield,” as it’s known locally, was slated to close last summer, but was saved when residents presented officials with a petition signed by 700 people (AL, Sept. 2002, p. 17). Trustees voted June 18 to shut it down, citing low use and the need for major renovations.

OREGON. A failed property-tax levy has forced Washington County libraries to operate at 2000 funding levels, despite a 9% growth in library use over the past year. Hillsboro Public Library alone lost about $350,000. Service cuts include reduced hours and elimination of some countywide reading programs.

PENNSYLVANIA. Some 600 library supporters gathered at the state capitol building in Harrisburg June 3 to urge legislators to restore $37.5 million—a 50% cut—in library services approved in March (AL, May, p. 15), but the budget year ended June 30 with little change.

Libraries braced for the worst. The Phoenixville Public Library, whose operating fund would decrease by 11%, started charging a $1 fee to circulate videos, while the Montgomery County–Norristown Public Library slashed its materials budget by $150,000 and imposed a hiring freeze.

The Carnegie Library in Pittsburgh announced June 26 a 21% reduction in operating hours, a 10% reduction in acquisitions spending, fees for computer classes, and the suspension of most outreach programs. “While we are hopeful that some or all of the funding will be restored in a supplemental budget to be considered shortly by the legislature, we have no choice but to act on the basis of the budget that will go into effect on July 1,” said Library Director Herb Elish.

SOUTH CAROLINA. State aid to the 42 county library systems has been cut in half over the past three years, and in 2003 they are only getting $1.01 per capita—a level not seen since 1985. State Library Director Jim Johnson said in the June 17 Greenville News that midsize counties, such as Laurens and Pickens, will have a tougher time finding local money to offset the loss. Greenville County will dip into its reserves to replace the lost state aid.

TENNESSEE. The Chattanooga–Hamilton County Bicentennial Library is looking at a nearly $1.3-million budget gap hampering its ability to pay for raises, higher health insurance, and a new file server. Director David Clapp hopes to bridge it by cutting Sunday and branch hours rather than staff, although the final funding mix will be up to city and county administrators.

Despite a loss of more than $9 million in state funds and stagnant sales-tax collections, the Nashville Metro Council unanimously passed an amendment June 24 to open all 20 Nashville Public Library branches on Fridays. Only the central library has been open Fridays since 2000, when city cuts caused 11 branches to reduce hours. The library system received an additional $1.1 million in the council’s substitute to Mayor Bill Purcell’s proposed budget, $60,000 of which restored library services for blind and handicapped patrons, which has been eliminated due to a loss of federal funding.

WASHINGTON. Instead of curbing public services in the face of severe cuts (AL, Apr., p. 24–25), the Washington State Library minimized services to state employees effective July 1. “The legislature made it very clear,” State Librarian Jan Walsh announced. “The State Library must continue to serve as the backbone of our community libraries, provide resources for those entrusted to our state institutions, and provide access to our historic collections. Service to public employees was the only function left to cut.” The library has trimmed its staff by 35 positions and cut its budget by $2.7 million in the past year.

WEST VIRGINIA. West Virginia University in Morgantown began charging state residents $50 a year to check books out, even though it’s been traditionally free to the public.

WISCONSIN. Although facing a $2-billion deficit, Democratic Gov. Jim Doyle kept state aid to library systems flat instead of reducing it in the 2003–2005 budget he gave the legislature in February. Waukesha Library System Administrator Thomas J. Hennen Jr. told AL that Republicans in the state assembly were “reluctant to bother libraries after last year’s fiasco when we were deluged by the public for trying to remove the ‘free to the public’ language in state law” (AL, May 2002, p. 22).

Still, some places are feeling the pinch. School districts across the state are cutting media specialists, with Milwaukee releasing 13.25 FTE positions and Stevens Point cutting half the district’s 14 librarians. The Cofrin Library at the University of Wisconsin at Green Bay will close two hours earlier in the fall to address state cuts. And Brown County supervisors have put the library’s bookmobile and its Southwest branch on a short list of potential cuts.

GUAM. The island’s economic doldrums have caused the Guam Public Library System to keep its Agat branch open only on Tuesdays. Director Arlene Cohen said a shorter government work week of 32 hours implemented in February and higher salaries off island have made it hard to retain staff.

—George M. Eberhart

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