Library Funding Yet Again By Agnes Moran October 18, 2013 The views expressed are my own personal views and do not represent any official position of the Borough Assembly. Every Borough resident, with the exception of the folks in Saxman, pays to support library operations. (If you rent instead of own, your landlord is paying taxes that support the library on your behalf and most likely recouping the cost through your rent payment.) Borough residents residing outside of the city boundaries of Saxman and Ketchikan pay an additional $422,570 or roughly $82 per person for operational support for the library. This year the City of Ketchikan asked for a 4.25% increase in the Borough operational funding amount and consideration of support for capital costs for the new library. The Borough declined to participate in capital costs since they heard very clearly from the constituents who didn t get to vote on the library project and were, therefore, not interested in paying for it. Contrary to popular belief, the Borough did not refuse to pay the $422,570 for operational costs. What the Borough asked for was information on library usage rates before it would consider an adjustment in the level of operational support for the library. In other words, the Borough wanted to know what its $422,570 was buying. This request for usage information created a great bit of controversy, and unnecessarily so. Libraries across the country routinely collect various statistics on library usage to justify funding levels and to ensure they are meeting the needs of their customers. Similar information should be easily attainable for our community. Perhaps the Borough did not request the correct information on usage statistics. If this was the case, the library administrators, as the experts, should have directed the Borough to information that would provide data useful for the funding decision making process. Instead of entering into a dialogue with Borough administration to identify a mutually beneficial data set, the City administration attacked the Borough by accusing them of being unreasonable and uncooperative. We're all Borough residents. The City built themselves into a tight budget bind and they need to solve their fiscal problems. Trying to bully a subset of Borough residents into paying more to bail the City out is not an acceptable solution. Agnes Moran About: "local resident interested in a variety of issues" Received October 15, 2013 - Published October 18, 2013
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