Buffalo Library, Facing at Least 21% Cut, Mulls Options
By Norman Oder Jul 29, 2010The busier-than-ever Buffalo & Erie County Public Library (BECPL), NY, this week learned it faces a 21 percent budget cut for 2011, and is beginning to confront potential changes--including staffing configurations, work processes, and reduced services--to absorb the cut.
Meeting yesterday, the library board decided it will ask county officials for a $22.9 million, which would represent stable county funding, though that request may be symbolic. "I don't think there's really a lot of optimism that's going to be funded," library director Bridget Quinn-Carey told LJ. "The county's in bad shape, and there's not a lot of public sentiment for increasing taxes."
She noted that the library already has been managing a $1.8 million funding shortfall for more than a year, and that the library's budget hole approaches $6.5 million, or nearly 29 percent. (The total budget last year, including state funding and local fees/fundraising, was about $27.5 million.)
BECPL, once a heavily branched system, lost nearly 25 percent of its county funding between 2004 and 2005, causing the closure of 15 branches, leaving 37.
Options
"How do we restructure our staff?" Quinn-Carey said, musing about potential changes. She noted that BECPL is a federated system, with both branch libraries and member libraries. Some revised "mutual understanding about staffing models," she said, might help keep open hours.
Also, she noted, BECPL may not be able to afford to continue its distributed acquisitions and collection development, which enables branch staffers to make local decisions--a practice numerous libraries have dropped.
"Those are the kind of things we've been talking around the edges a long time," she said.
Would BECPL close branches? "I think everything's on the table now," said Quinn-Carey, noting that it's very early in the process. "I think the whole notion of closing libraries and reducing hours is part of a much larger discussion" of maintaining sustainable library services.
BECPL works with three staff unions. Have concessions been discussed? "This is so new," Quinn-Carey said. "Everybody is still a little in shock." Meetings with union reps are forthcoming.
Getting the word out
"As far as the public, I think our board wants to get the word out how important libraries are to them, what we're offering the community, and what's at stake," Quinn-Carey said. "I think there is some sensitivity on our board that the county really doesn't have lots of options to fund us. People around here are hurting and the thought of increasing taxes is a tough sell."
"I think it's the guidance of our board to look at this in a broader perspective," she added. "Instead of communities thinking, ‘I'm going to fight for this branch,' how do we pull together and preserve library services?"
BECPL's hold-steady budget must be presented by August 15. The county legislature gets the budget in the beginning of October, and the budget should be resolved by late November.
State of the library
"It's so sad; people here really love their libraries," Quinn-Carey said. "The use, and the feedback, and the appreciation that we know the public feels--it makes it even more tragic, because the services are so well used. This has been in institution they've been able to look to for a number of years. To see it seemingly slipping away is tough....We have to deal with the realities of our public funding situation and try to make the best of it."
In her September 2009 State of the Library Address, Quinn-Carey said, "We have seen dramatic increase in ALL of our activity measurements. Not one usage measure is decreasing or even remaining static."
She noted that the library was introducing RFID technology for more effective material handling capabilities and self-service and that staffing service models had begun to shift from a building-based model to a team structure.
BECPL's three key initiatives are literacy, special collections, and economic development support efforts. Quinn-Carey warned at the time, "We need to be vigilant in our vocal and financial support of libraries in Erie County" and said it was vital to develop additional sources of revenue. Nearly a year later, a reckoning is arriving.
