Library cuts make for chaos

Spokane library checkouts are down 11 percent so far this year following deep cuts in hours of operation at the city’s six branches.

Library hours went from 260 to 140 a week in January, concentrating activity at all of the city libraries, particularly at the popular Shadle and South Hill neighborhood branches.

Checkout lines at the Shadle branch have been more reminiscent of a supermarket aisle than a quiet neighborhood library, the result of a $1 million cut in city spending on libraries in 2005.

“We are waiting longer,” said Tina Valdez, as she and her daughter stood in a checkout line at least a dozen patrons deep at the Shadle branch on Tuesday.

Valdez is home-schooling her daughter, Sierra, 8, so public library services are vital to providing a broad range of material. Because of shortened hours at city branches, Valdez now is making a weekly circuit on the North Side of three city and county libraries to obtain enough materials to keep her daughter busy.

“We use the library a lot,” she said.

Hours at the Shadle and South Hill branches were each cut from 44 to 24 hours a week, a reduction of 45 percent from 2004. They are the largest of five neighborhood city branches. The smaller branches – Hillyard, Indian Trail and East Side – are open just two days a week.

In the first two months of the year, circulation at Shadle and South Hill each fell from 77,000 items in 2004 to 66,000 items in January and February, for a drop of about 15 percent. The three smaller branches have seen circulation drops of 22 to 26 percent.

Librarians have scrambled to keep up because there are 15 fewer staffers to handle the workload. Returned materials back up in work rooms. Checkout lines run virtually nonstop.

Patrons must squeeze their library visits into fewer days each week. At the Shadle branch, the parking lot is frequently filled, and some patrons are forced to use a nearby shopping center lot.

Library Director Jan Sanders said the staffers at Shadle and South Hill are now handling 360 checkouts per hour compared with 230 per hour in 2004.

“They are just going on a dead run,” Sanders said. “They can’t manage their work as efficiently as they once did because of the sheer volume of it.”

Each of the neighborhood librarians is now assigned to work at two branches as a result of the way 2005 budget cuts were implemented.

Shadle and South Hill are open on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays while the Indian Trail, East Side and Hillyard branches are open on Wednesdays and Fridays. Teams shift back and forth among the branches, and normally find a backup of returned materials at the start of each work day.

As a result, Sanders is dispatching staffers from downtown to the different branches during closed days to check in and stack returned materials on shelves.

In a memo to City Council members, Sanders wrote, “We constantly battle a backlog of books and other items to be checked in, reshelved or marked for reserve.”

With staff rushing to keep up, there is little time for the traditional help library users have enjoyed over the years, she said. “Perhaps most troublesome is the fact that with this increased density of service, staff is not able to give the kind of value-added, first-rate service we would like to (deliver) – and the public has come to expect,” her memo said.

Sanders said she and the library board are reassessing schedules and staffing to determine if there is a more efficient way to operate.

But city budget problems might worsen in 2006. Chief Financial Officer Gavin Cooley said on Thursday that the city is facing at least another 1 percent budget cut next year.

Many library users appear to have taken the 2005 budget cuts in stride.

At the Shadle branch this week, Brian Fitzpatrick and his two children were checking out books because Casey, 6, and Kellie, 5, are just learning to read.

“They are closed tomorrow so we thought we’d come in today,” Fitzpatrick said.