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March 8, 2006
"Perry plan: Sacrifice the library"
When I visited the circulation desk this morning to buy gifts for my trip to China, Michelle, our fearless head of circulation pointed vigorously to a newspaper and said firmly, "Read this article."
For those who don't know Michelle, she is generally a happy person (when she's not giving an insolent patron the business), and often the bringer of funny bits via email. However, her firm demeanor was quite forboding.
Indeed, the article was nothing to laugh about.
At least one of our circ staff lives in North Andover, where School Committee Chairman Alfred Perry has proposed that the solution to the town budget issues is to close the library. We've all read about library closings across the country, and closing the library is often the way that towns try to salvage funding for other public services such as safety and education.
What struck me hardest, and irritated me most, was the reasoning that Mr. Perry used for his self-titled "Perry plan." More than once in the article, he's quoted with saying that he's just trying to "think outside the box" in terms of finding a solution to the budget issue. He decided to visualize the town as a business in trouble, to "re-strategize" and "re-prioritize" to find a solution.
Later in the article, it becomes evident why Mr. Perry doesn't see the Stevens Memorial Library as a priority. To quote the author's paraphrase of a statement from Mr. Perry, apparently the "rapid evolution of information gathering in the apst decade has made libraries less necessary for many purposes." He goes on to suggest that "some services could be transferred to the library at the high school."
This mentality, documented so openly in a local paper from a local government official, frightens and angers me *terribly*. Is it because he's not a library user? Is he just thinking like a businessman and not seeing the social profit of education and cultural experience that comes from a library? Does he ignore the social profit for pure economic gain, or because he doesn't believe it's really wonderful, or because he doesn't care? Or is he just trying to use a sensationalist tactic to prompt others to come up with more reasonable ideas for saving the town's budget? I'm honestly not sure. The only way to really know would be to ask him.
The library must have done some work convincing the town that it was valuable, seeing as the library did recently experience a renovation, so it's sad to see the town invest money like that and then turn around and close the library. Mr. Perry must not know too much about libraries, being as he volunteered the high school library to take up some of the services of the town library. Does he realize that a high school library may not be equipped to handle the needs of the general population? Will the lower school libraries take up the storytime programs? Does the high school library even have the resources to sufficiently service the kids, nevermind even just a few of the public library services?
In a direct quote, Mr. Perry does try to place some salve on the seething open wound by saying, "I'm not saying the library's not a great place to go. The library's a terrific place to go, but libraries have become antiquated systems."
What hurts my head most about this statement is that libraries, on many levels, have become antiquated systems. We all know that. But for a local public official who seems on the surface to lack real information about libraries, how they work, and what value they provide to proclaim that libraries are outdated without the right reasons just adds insult to injury. Many libraries are making every effort to evolve; unfortunately, it's not a unified profession-wide effort, and the result is an uneven view of libraries on the whole.
This may sound like I'm getting all hot and bothered over nothing, something that isn't new, and doesn't warrant so much heat and bother. I haven't done much reading on Library 2.0 (although I will be hitting Chris's Library 2.0 reading list as a starting point), but I think I know enough to say that I don't like the Library 2.0 moniker for the concept, which is not really new. I much prefer Kevin Dames's MIC approach, or something like it.
From what I have read (being as I've only been in the profession a few years), Library 2.0 puts a (trendy) label on the struggling paradigm shift that's been brewing over the past ten years or so, stifled by librarians, systems, organizations, governing bodies, and environments with a resistance to change, crippling librarians who want change but don't have the necessary skills and resources, and keeping new librarians who can aid in the evolution out of jobs. While the shift is coming more to the forefront of our profession, the information still hasn't quite made it's way to the governing organizations that so often control the budgets of libraries. The "Perry plan" makes this situation painfully apparent. So while we discuss the "Library 2.0" idea amongst ourselves, don't forget there's still work to be done convincing the likes of Mr. Perry that we're worth having around at all.
March 8, 2006 12:36 PM