Library funding cuts

[Hannah Peele]

This is why I’m okay paying higher property taxes…to support one of the few remaining resources accessible to all….so just use your noggins please. 

Here's what matters, and what a budget line can't show: the bulk of these reductions falls on temporary staffing, the flexible hours that keep both branches open full schedules and run programs and outreach. Take those hours away, and permanent staff are pulled into core duties, keeping books on the shelves and the doors open, leaving little room for anything more. The result, from library leadership: two fewer open days each week at both the Hillsborough and Carrboro branches, fewer programs, and a smaller collection. About seventy thousand dollars of the cut comes straight out of the collection and the supplies used for programs.

That's why a reduction that looks modest on paper is felt at the front door and on the shelves. It doesn't trim the edges; it removes the very capacity that keeps the library open and active.

When times get tight, library use goes up, not down. That is exactly when a locked door does the most damage, and it is worth picturing who stands at it. A parent who works all week and waits for Saturday to bring the kids to pick out a new stack of books. A job seeker with no computer at home, racing an application deadline. A student doing homework on the library's WiFi because there is none where they live. An older neighbor on a fixed income who comes in on a dangerously hot afternoon simply for a cool, safe place to sit. Someone for whom the walk to the library, and a librarian who knows their name, is the one reliable connection in a quiet week. For them, a closed library is not an inconvenience to plan around. It is a door that isn't there when they need it, a refuge that has gone dark. And every cancelled program is a child who loses the programs that keep them reading and learning, a new neighbor who loses the class that leads to a job, a community with one less place to come together.

There's also a quieter risk. Usage statistics are a key measure decision-makers look at when setting library budgets. If reduced hours drive use down, simply because the doors are closed more often, those lower numbers could later be used to justify further cuts, a cycle that is hard to reverse, especially now, with use at a ten-year high.

This is not a criticism of the Commissioners, who weigh many worthy community needs. It is simply why this decision matters, and why it helps for them to hear directly from the people the library serves, before they vote.

Orange County is managing rising costs, growing demand, and major capital needs while balancing the impact on taxpayers, and departments across the county are being asked to find reductions. The library has already absorbed about $122,000 in reductions in the County Manager's proposed budget; the proposed $200,000 amendment would come on top of that, for more than $300,000 combined.

Most of that falls on temporary staffing, the hours that keep both branches open on their current schedules and make programs and outreach possible, with a portion coming from the collection and program supplies. Because those flexible hours are the first thing to go, the effect is felt directly: two days closed at each branch per week, less programming, and a thinner collection. That's why even a cut that sounds modest is felt on the shelves and at the front door.

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Hannah Peele, Hillsborough 

c. (978) 968-3245