Committee to study library proposals

The Spokane Valley City Council appointed five citizens and two council members to a committee that will study the proposals submitted by contractors hoping to provide library services in the city next year.

The citizen appointees are Jennie Willardson, Julie Rosenoff, Joan Dunham, Donna Connell and Joni Driskell. The council appointees are Deputy Mayor Diana Wilhite and Councilman Mike Flanigan.

The group will review the two proposals submitted last month by the Spokane County Library District and by Library Systems & Services LLC (LSSI), a Maryland-based company. It will recommend one as the 2005 contractor.

At the same time, the city’s staff will review the proposals and make its own recommendation to the council.

The 2004 library services contract is valued at just over $2 million. The district’s proposal says it could do the job for about $2.27 million next year. LSSI’s proposal hasn’t been made public because of possible proprietary information in the document. Deputy City Attorney Cary Driskell said in a letter Monday that proposal will be made public Oct. 25 at the earliest.