The following is Library Director Susan Cooley's comments during recent county budget meetings:
To many people, the public library is the heart and soul of a community. It has recently been stated that our library here in Rome is not considered to be an essential service. Our libraries may not be essential to some in Floyd County but I venture to guess that they are ESSENTIAL to the 369,522 citizens who visited Floyd County libraries last year and to those 58,230 citizens and voters who have library cards.
I would like to read you a short section of, "How deeply can we afford to cut library budgets?" by Ron Carlee, executive in residence at the International City/County Managers Association. This is a group to which Floyd County Government is a member.
"Certainly there are services that local governments, especially non-rural governments, have to provide: police protection, fire service, emergency medical services, water and sewer. However, the question for these services is how much to provide, rather than whether or not to provide their service.
Even more challenging questions surround services that we often labeled "discretionary," but are important to the quality of life in a community, to social equity and to economic development. The objective of social equity becomes especially critical in a down economy. During the boom years, social equity was about the abject poor. Today, many middle, and upper-middle income households have seen their worlds shattered and need assistance they would never have anticipated. The most vulnerable are even more desperate than before. The public library plays an increasingly critical role in assisting citizens in their efforts to identify and apply for jobs, complete online training programs, and master the technology skills that are important in today's job market.
The following percentages are of people who used a public library computer or its internet access last year:
1/3 of Americans aged 14 or older
44% of persons living in households below poverty level
61% of young adults living in poverty
54% of seniors living in poverty.
For those 58,230 Floyd County library card holders and the369,522 citizens who visited Floyd County libraries last year, I would venture to guess that they would say checking out books, renting a meeting room, attending English as a second language classes to learn to speak English, working with a tutor to learn how to read a book, bringing their children to story time to become engaged in language creation and narrative, using a computer to fill out job applications or to look for employment or for those who simply want to learn how to use a computer, that their Floyd County libraries are essential to their daily lives.
I am sure that most Floyd County citizens don't agree with spending the lion's share of tax dollars on the 800 inmates in the Floyd County jail. By doing this we are maintaining the lifestyles of those who have broken the law rather than providing services that improve the majority of Floyd County tax-payers lives.
And I would add that people considering a move to Floyd County choose Floyd County because of the quality of its parks and libraries, not its prisons and jails. Companies considering relocation to our area expect educational and cultural institutions like libraries to serve their employees and to enhance the quality of life in the community. Newspaper articles detailing the systematic dismantling of an outstanding library system will effectively discourage businesses from choosing Rome as their new home.
We, the staff of the Floyd County libraries and the Sara Hightower Regional Library board of trustees, realize that the recession is a difficult time and that money is tight. We also know that we are essential to 58,230 library card holders in Floyd County.
We are proposing the following changes in our service that reflect a 10% cut in our current funding:
Closing the Rome-Floyd County Library on Fridays and Sundays which we estimate will save approximately $15,000. The 2625 people on average who visit on Friday and the 913 who use the library on Sundays will no longer have access to it on those days.
Freezing a position in public services and a partial salary of a retiree will save approximately $40,500. By freezing this position we will need to eliminate many of our popular computer classes since this person will be working in public services part of the time.
Cave Spring library will lose $2000. The loss of these funds will reduce the number of hours Cave Spring will be open each week and will reduce the number of books, dvds and children's materials they will be able to purchase for the Cave Spring community.
Books, DVDs, children's materials will be cut $39,500 which is eliminating almost 20% of the money we have to purchase these items.
Supplies will be cut $10,000.
Postage and vehicle expense will be cut $4000.
Part-time employee salaries will be cut $51,855.
Any further cuts will result in the elimination of the Floyd County Prison Cleaning Crew and the television station.
We, the staff of the Rome Floyd County Library, the Cave Spring Library and the Sara Hightower Board of Trustees, urge you to consider our libraries as essential to the health and well-being of Floyd County and that they deserve to be funded as essential services for the citizens and voters of Floyd County.
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