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Shorter Menino and Amy Ryan: We have to close library branches to make them more accessible to the community
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Do Menino and Ryan want to close your library?
Click here to get directions to the closest library if Menino and Ryan close your library. You know, the public "free" library that you pay taxes to fund. Also check to see where the next closest one is after that because it seems they intend to close up to 8 of the 26 branches.
The state budgeted less for the boston public library and the city, which has spent about $30 million a year on the Boston Public Library, this year declared a total budget shortfall of 3.5 million.
No sense spending part of the 5.5 million dollar budget excess for snow removal this year on libraries because who knows if we might need, it might snow again this summer.
forget about snow and libraries
This is the way the budget works - whoever tracks the numbers looks every month or quarter to see how we are doing (Boston's revenues are HIGHLY predictable - property taxes are guaranteed, state aid only varies once every 5-10 years when they have to make a midyear cut and the other stuff is so small - especially individually - that none if it amounts to a hill of beans). If there is any surplus - like in the snow budget - they call the police, fire or DPW department - depending who has been good this year and other political factors - and they allow them to book overtime. They always manage it so that there is a few million dollars left at the end of the year and they can do this because they have a couple of revenue sources that come from separate trusts/reserves so it always looks like we have a small surplus. Any extra can get spent and if the last quarter gets a little mussed due to the nasty legislature cutting local aid - it's OK - then you can cut the OT and pull a little extra out of the trusts. There is no such thing as taking unspent money and "reallocating" it to plug holes. This is just one of the games they play - some reasonable, some like the OT budget not so reasonable when you have a $3 billion unfunded liability for retiree benefits - but who cares that won't really hit the city for 5-10 years when Tommy is long gone and can blame it on the guy then in charge.
Thanks Stevil
Your insights into finance, City finances, tax revenues, budget process are invaluable. Keep it comming.
I think the only point of raising the snow removal budget surplus is to pressure the mayor and the BPL President Amy Ryan to keep their hands off our libraries.
Shades of 1984
Perhaps the Mayor and President of the Library read 1984 - copies borrowed from which branches? To wit:
Closing libraries increase accessibility? Removing access to books increases books read? Increased library patronage requires fewer libraries to patronize? Why is Menino picking on the city's library? Perhaps the Commonwealth's legislature could pass a bill banning bullying by mayors.
You can write Gov Patrick, your state Senator and State Rep
at congress.org and ask them to restore state funding for public libraries on www.congress.org EXAMPLE.
An Open Letter to
March 30, 2010
An Open Letter to
Deval Patrick (D-MA)
Marian Walsh (D-MA 35th)
Michael F. Rush (D-MA 133rd)
Governor Patrick was elected on a platform of raising the priority of public education in a variety of significant ways to help make Commonwealth students the most competitive, accomplished students in the US. He himself has experienced the power of education and the opportunity accomplishment in academic study reliably provides. His plans included money for early education initiatives and extended day.
Faced with a fiscal crisis of great proportions, government at all levels have tightened and slashed budgets in all areas but we must not do so in a way that abandons our priorities for the future.
The best value available in education is access to our public libraries, the community and education they foster for citizens in all demographics including young to old, in all ethnic and race groups, and people whose families have been in the US for generations and people who are new to the Commonwealth and the country.
Please restore the funding for our public libraries as they are so important to our future as a Commonwealth and as a country.
Chair Boston Public Library Board of Trustees
Mr. Jeffrey Rudman, Esq.
Chair Boston Public Library Board of Trustees
C/O Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr LLP
Dear Mr. Rudman.
Please consider the community’s response the proposition that the way forward for the Boston Public Library is to close branches.
The BPL is funded largely by tax dollars. Shouldn’t the taxpayers voice weigh heavily in this decision?
I think if the board spends some time listening to the community they will decide that a transformation of the BPL should not be driven by a budget shortfall but in the context of full funding. We will not always be in an economic downturn and so plans for the future of the BPL should not be formulated as if we will be.
There is a name for seizing on a financial crisis to ram through new policy “reform”. It is called The Shock Doctrine (see Naomi Klein). Employing the shock doctrine is an insult to the values and the intelligence of the people of the City of Boston.
A $3.6 million dollar budget shortfall for the BPL could be filled the mayor with the help of his finance people if the value of our libraries to the people of Boston was fully realized by our mayor. If the Mayor and President of the BPL Amy Ryan also understood the value the people of the City of Boston placed on their libraries, the transformation President Amy Ryan sought could be accomplished in the context of full funding or even expanded funding. Present the plan to patrons and measured their support. Then you will know what they value and how their money should be spent.
Below is a sample of the community’s response to the current track being pursued by Mayor Menino and President Ryan. Please share this with other board members if you would. Thank you for your time and consideration.
Shorter Menino and Amy Ryan: We have to close library branches to make them more accessible to the community
http://www.universalhub.com/node/32159#comment-122880
Marching for libraries
https://www.universalhub.com/2010/marching-libraries
The Future of Libraries, BPL President Amy Ryan
https://www.universalhub.com/2010/even-if-your-lib...
Mayor Menino - the future of the Boston Public Library
https://www.universalhub.com/2010/even-if-your-lib...