As a reporter, but also as a citizen and as an avid reader, it was very interesting around the library last week, and downtown and then at the annual meeting for the Southeast Regional Library on Saturday.
You might say I was sort of immersed in the library and the issues swirling around this treasured facility and service, as I went to the book sale (picking up a few interesting-looking titles) and the “Drop Everything and Read”event on Friday held in support of the public library system, where quite a large number of residents showed up.
If that wasn’t enough, I then took in the regional library meeting on Saturday, and it was clear there are many, many communities that hold their libraries very near and dear to their hearts.
As the regional library board chair told the group, the provincial government has woken up a giant, and the giant is not a very happy camper these days, particularly in light of certain comments from the government.
Some of the comments have been suggestions or assertions that are simply not true or are just plain ridiculous, such as the idea that somehow libraries are flush with cash in reserves, and they should use those to deal with the incredibly unfair and deep cuts of 58 per cent to the funding of regional libraries.
Newsflash: Libraries are in fact not flush with reserves. There are reserves where money is very strictly designated for a specific purpose, and these are not available to plug huge gaping holes in funding created by government cuts.
As an example, Southeast Regional Library has been building up a reserve to replace their van, which is on the verge of breaking down and being put out of commission. This isn’t exactly money that could be put towards a shortfall of over $565,000, which is what has been cut from their funding by the government.
There was a suggestion by the minister, Don Morgan, that closing the doors to SILS, the inter-library lending service that had been in use by libraries throughout Saskatchewan, should not have happened. Well, with funding cuts that are severe and crippling, there simply weren’t dollars available to keep it running, and contrary to the minister’s comments, it is the government’s fault.
Then there were the ideas of there being too many libraries (even though our population is spread out over a large area) and that libraries could be put into schools. What about the concept of security, and allowing strangers to wander around schools? And what of adult materials that are found in libraries being put in school libraries? Somehow these ideas weren’t thought through very well.
