When "Free" Library Services Aren't Actually Free
When Library "Services" Become a Disservice to the Public's Pocketbook
Libraries provide services, but you pay for those services. Libraries should try to be good stewards, saving every nickel and penny possible. Yet, if they aren’t doing that, then what are you to them? If they don’t care how they spend their money or if it hurts the taxpayer when they do spend their money, does it matter if they have free services when even free is too expensive?
In the Library world, for Missouri, there are two main choices when they want to network and share resources. This type of sharing is often called Interlibrary Loans where they share books, audiobooks, or DVDs, and other items.
It’s a great system and when I worked at a college library, I fulfilled many of those requests through MOBIUS. MOBIUS is typically for Academic libraries and only four public libraries in Missouri are in MOBIUS. The rest participate in Missouri Evergreen because they realize most of their patrons don’t need to access rare academic texts.
Also, the costs may be considerably lower. I spoke with Donna Bacon, MOBIUS’s Executive Director. She replied to my email about the costs for a Library with a collection about the size of Christian County’s and with our circulation. I used their numbers they provided in their December meeting.
She replied back with this email.
These numbers were based on a hypothetical library, yet I tried to use the numbers provided by CCL in their December meeting. So, for CCL, the cost range is right around $12K. CCL however buries the actual cost to MOBIUS in their budget and doesn’t itemize.
I think it is a fair question to ask what it would cost for CCL to move to Missouri Evergreen. Below are the published costs listed for the libraries working with Missouri Evergreen.
The top five costs are Scenic Regional Library ($20,164) (Owensville, MO Gasconade County [pop. 14,768]), Jefferson County Library ($19,060) (Hillsboro, MO Jefferson County [pop. 229,336]), Cass County Library ($17,226) (Harrisonville, MO Cass County [pop. 110,394), St. Joseph Public Library ($11,639.15) (St. Joseph, MO [pop. 70,656]), and Trails Regional Library ($10,590) (Warrensburg, MO Johnson and Lafayette Counties [pop. 87329]).
Ozark is our County Seat and Christian County’s population is 93,114. However, it’s not about county size. It’s about book collection and circulation. The Scenic Regional Library is an outlier. While they are close to St. Louis, the population of Gasconade County overall is low. Perhaps there is another reason their costs are so high that are not associated with normal costs for this year. However, I don’t want to exclude them without knowing why they are an outlier.
These are the five libraries who spend the most. However, if you look at the record, many Libraries spend considerably less overall. Webster County spends $2636. Texas County spends $1979. Stone County spends $3084. Neosho-Newton County spends $3713. Perhaps, they are the most similar to us, being near a larger city and county.
Our Library Budget increased from $3.5M to $4M last year. The Executive Director is putting together reports on building expansions and repairs so they can put a bond issue in front of the Taxpayers for the next year. In the budget, it seems they cannot find the money for basic building maintenance and they expect bond issues to keep up the maintenance on repairs.
I’m asking why we can’t look at saving costs for the taxpayer. If Missouri Evergreen can do that, why aren’t we considering it? Could it be because our Executive Director is a Board Member for MOBIUS?
When I was emailing Donna Bacon, she mentioned that the future goals for MOBIUS include bringing Missouri Evergreen libraries into MOBIUS—increasing the costs to the taxpayer duplicating services we don’t really need for Missouri Public Libraries.
I did not ask for this information from her. She provided it on her own. It worries me that our Public Libraries are going to be asked to come up with even more money—maybe as little as $10K or up to $20K or more depending on their circulation and their book collection size.
Yet, that money doesn’t come from the Library. They don’t have their own printing press in the back. They don’t publish books that they sell which covers their costs. They rely on us to pony up the cash every single year. 84 libraries doing a minimum of $10,000 a year would amount to $840,000 a year in increased taxes. I know it doesn’t seem like much when our state is already spending $50 Billion a year.
How much more can you afford out of your income though? Can you do another nickel? Ten cents? Another dollar? Ten dollars? At what point does the taxation become theft? At what point do all the extra services end in your bankruptcy?