New Jersey’s most impoverished city will close all three branches of its public library at year’s end unless a rescue can be pulled off.
Camden’s library board says the libraries won’t be able to afford to stay open past Dec. 31 because of budget cuts from the city government. The city had its subsidy from the state cut.
The library board president says the library system, which opened in 1904, is preparing to donate, sell or destroy its collections, including 187,000 books.
Oh, c’mon. Sell the collection? That’s like school districts cutting busing first. I’m sure the budget is tighter and staff will have to be cut to the point where minimal service hours might be offered to the public, but this makes no sense other than political blackmail.
The wisdom indicates that if you want a charitable organization to administer a thing, do NOT let that organization be government.
In Madison, Wisconsin, a family left a farm and buildings to the county for the use and support of handicapped persons. The county changed the rules and then sold the place a few years ago. DO NOT TRUST GOVERNMENT!
Don
This is the perfect opportunity to get rid of all the books and convert to electronic books. Libraries as we know them won’t exist in 20 years anyway, so why not start now?
Doesn’t Camden have a long history of corruption? I would not be surprised to find out money meant for library funding went to other priorities.
D.K. I hate electronic books and I doubt I am alone in that sentiment.
There is a tendency for government to create threats to things universally accepted, such as libraries, as an excuse to raise taxes. Camden city hall has this Biblical motto on it: “Where there is no vision, the people perish.” Unfortunately it has always had ironic connotations, particularly after the city lost RCA Victor and Campbell Soup.
#4–I agree. I hate them. BUT in a few years that is all there will be. We won’t be the ones leading the revolution. Our grandchildren/great grandchildren will not know any other way. Even if we keep some books in paper, the other issue is the library itself and why public libraries were started. The type of access to knowledge by the masses that was invisioned in the 1800’s is now almost universally available on the internet. Even if we keep paper books, it seems like a good time for us to start re-thinking what a library should be. Is it a huge, unnecessary expense (buildings, books, personnel, utilities) when in a few years we will have layered CD’s which can hold the entire contents of the Library of Congress on one disc? When thinking of government I always love to think of Linclon’s quote–the dogmas of the quite past are inadequate for the stormy present. We must think anew and act anew if we are to save our country.
I have a very unusual library of over 1,000 books. These are the kind with paper and ink in them. I am always overjoyed when I find one of them on the internet because I can more easily refer to them and encourage others to read them as most of my books are old and difficult to find.
One problem, however, is the doctoring of some texts. I have a very early version of Andrew Jackson’s autobiography and it bears little resemblance to the one I read in school. The other problem is that the internet is subject to massive forced editing and censorship by government and large powers that be. I’ll keep my old books, thank you. I want my grandson to read everyone of them. If he is equipped with such knowledge and wisdom he will easily be able to navigate the modern forest.
Don
#7–I agree with you. But I bet at least 1/2 of the people are this site siad 15 yeasr ago they would NEVER use a computer or cell phone. Tempus fugit.
comments turning to electronic books compared to physical books . . .
An important difference is that if you have an electronic copy of a book that is in-copyright, you can’t lend it to a friend. The situation is more-or-less the same for a library: a library can’t lend electronic copies of in-copyright books by copying the library’s copy onto your reader. Electronic books are somewhat the end of lending libraries as we know them in the U.S., with all their merits.