So the D.C. Public Library system is facing a $2 million reduction in next year’s staff budget. The word is that all city libraries will probably have to close on Fridays, as well as reduce hours on weekdays and close completely five kiosk branches that serve needy neighborhoods. This is bad news. Mayor Fenty has said, however, that he is committed to finding the money to keep the libraries open at their normal hours.
And in case you missed it, yesterday Marc Fisher revealed that DCPL is actually sitting “on a $2 million bequest donated expressly to improve the offerings at two of the system’s neediest branches.” The money, left in the will of wealthy D.C. resident Elizabeth Holden and designed to help two branches in particular — the Francis Gregory Branch in Southeast and the Woodridge Branch in Northeast — has hardly been spent even though the system received it nine years ago. Holden didn’t want her gift to be used to overcome budget gaps, so the neat coincidence that it was for exactly the amount the DCPL budget was cut doesn’t matter in reality. Still, it’s tough not to take these two stories and start to feel all down on the city’s library system again.
By all accounts, Ginnie Cooper, the District’s chief librarian for the past two years, has had a lot of success making improvements to the system. Circulation is up 20 percent over last year. But now DCPL is facing a staff and budget shortage due to a combination of a lot of library employees having taken the mayor’s citywide early retirement incentive and the fact that all vacant positions in city agencies were removed from the 2009 budget. There are fewer employees, and the library system can’t hire any more. When Mayor Fenty first announced his early retirement program, he said that “It is imperative that the District recruits, retains and then develops the next generation of leaders before decades of institutional knowledge walks out the door.” We certainly hope the mayor can find a way to get the next generation of librarians into D.C. public libraries before they are forced to cut their hours.
Photo by army.arch
