CONGRESS REDUCES FUNDING FOR LSTA
Despite the fact that all year it looked as if the President and the Congress would significantly increase funding for the Library Services and Technology Act state grant program, the final number in the omnibus budget bill that passed before Congress adjourned for Christmas was down 2% from the 2007 funding level. This follows a year in which funding was flat. President Bush recommended, and the Congress agreed, to a funding level for the state grant program of $171.5 million earlier in the year, but the final number was only $160.9 million. At the higher amount, Oregon would have received an increase of about $130,000 in our LSTA allotment. With the reduced appropriation, Oregon will receive about $46,000 less than it did in 2007. Since the State Library Board passed a budget that assumed no reduction in funding, they will need to revisit the budget at their February 14th meeting to consider how the 2008 budget can be balanced.
BOARD GRANTS APPEAL REQUEST FROM MALHEUR CO. LIBRARY
At their meeting on December 14th in Salem, the State Library Board increased the Ready to Read Grant for the Malheur County Library to reflect a continuation of county-wide service. For decades the Library has been funded by both the City of Ontario and Malheur County, but recent budget problems forced the County to end their support beginning last July. However in October, the County agreed to provide $8,500 to help support bookmobile service to some county residents. The Board decided that this qualified the Library for a larger grant based on the population and square mileage of the entire county outside of the cities of Vale and Nyssa.
In other action, the Board awarded LSTA grants for 2008 to the Deschutes Public Library, Portland State University and Oregon State University. The grant awards were not recommended by the LSTA Advisory Council earlier in the year. The Board voted to make the awards to PSU and OSU contingent on significantly increased funding for LSTA by the Congress. These awards are now in jeopardy, due to the unexpected reduction in funding for LSTA allotments to the states. The Board also approved a proposal for the Library to give more assistance to users of the Oregon.gov website. The proposal will be recommended to Governor Kulongoski for possible inclusion in his budget request to the 2009 Legislature.
The next meeting of the State Library Board will be held on February 14, 2008, at the Midland Branch of the Multnomah County Library.
BOARD ELECTS NEW MEMBERS TO LSTA ADVISORY COUNCIL
The Oregon State Library
Board of Trustees elected five new members to the LSTA Advisory Council at their
December 14 meeting. Representing library users are Ann Pearson of Portland,
Ann Evensen of Bend, and Nancy Brown of Hermiston. Ms. Pearson is currently
the President of the Friends of the Multnomah County Library and serves on OLA's
scholarship committee. Ms. Evensen will be serving a second term, and brings
experience from the Deschutes Public Library District Board and Foundation.
Ms. Brown has been a board member of the Umatilla County Special Library District,
and is currently serving on the Hermiston Public Library Board. Oregon Association
of School Libraries Executive Director and former State Library Board member
Jim Hayden will represent school libraries. Disadvantaged library users will
be represented by Sherry Stock, the Executive Director of the Brain Injury Association
of Oregon and member of the Molalla Public Library Board.
STATEWIDE DATABASE LICENSING ADVISORY COUNCIL GEARS UP FOR VENDOR SELECTION PROCESS
For the last five years the State Library, using LSTA funds, has subsidized the Statewide Database Licensing Program for academic, public, school, and (more recently) tribal libraries.
The Statewide Database Licensing Advisory Committee (SDLAC) is an advisory committee reporting to the LSTA Council and consists of representatives of all library types.
Every five years, SDLAC in conjunction with the State Library goes through the process of selecting electronic database vendors. In 2008, SDLAC will focus on general periodicals and in 2009 the focus will be on newspaper databases.
Because of limited resources,
general periodicals and newspaper databases are the sole focus of SDLAC and
the State Library. However, this
page on our website provides information on other group purchase opportunities
offered by BCR, the Orbis Cascade Alliance and the Oregon Educational Technology
Consortium.
OREGON HOLDS ITS OWN IN NATIONAL PUBLIC LIBRARY RANKINGS
For the past decade or so, Oregon public libraries have been at or near the top of national public library rankings. In November, the National Center for Education Statistics released its latest report on U.S. public libraries in 2005 and Oregon continues to shine. As has been true for a number of years, Oregon public libraries trail only Ohio in library circulation per capita (14.91). Oregon also is the runner-up in interlibrary loans per 1,000 population served (750.56), with Wisconsin taking top honors. Oregon ranks a respectable 10th in library operating expenditures per capita, and ranks 8th in operating revenue from local sources. While Oregon libraries only have an average number of books per capita in their collections, they rank 7th in audio materials per capita and 17th in video materials per capita. Oregon ranks in about the middle of the 50 states for overall library staffing per capita, but ranks 16th in the number of professional librarians per capita. Oregon's reference transactions per capita are slightly below average for the nation, as are the number of public access Internet computers per capita, where Oregon ranks 33rd. Whether Oregon can maintain these rankings in future reports is open to question, given the funding problems that have caused library services to be curtailed in Southern Oregon and elsewhere in the state in recent years.
RULES FOR DRIVER'S LICENSES CHANGING IN FEBRUARY
Most Oregon public libraries use driver's licenses as a way of establishing identity for people applying for library cards. In 2008 the DMV will have new administrative rules for issuing drivers licenses, the result of an Executive Order by Governor Kulongoski in November. Under the new rules, applicants for new, renewal or replacement driver's licenses, permits or ID cards will have to provide a valid Social Security number, which will need to be verified through the Social Security Administration, or sign a statement saying they were never issued a Social Security number. Applicants who have never been issued a Social Security number and present a document issued by a foreign government will need to provide a valid Department of Homeland Security document proving legal residency. The new requirements are not as stringent as the requirements of the Real ID Act, a federal law which Oregon has yet to implement. Bills to implement the Real ID Act in Oregon may be taken up by the Legislature when they hold their supplemental session in February.
WEBJUNCTION RURAL WEBINARS CONTINUE IN 2008
Join WebJunction for the next free,
hour-long webinar: Thursday, January 24, 2008, at 11:00 a.m. "Collaborating
with your Community" will feature Bonnie McKewon, Director of Northwest
Iowa Library Service, as she presents a "Top 10" list of ideas to
reinvigorate cooperation among libraries. Ideas like shared programming, shared
staffing, board and staff development days, county-wide wikis, and more will
be discussed. Go to the WebJunction website for instructions on joining
the webinar.
A report from the National Endowment for the Arts on reading habits of Americans caused a stir in November. To Read or Not to Read presents an impressive array of statistics collected in recent years that purport to show that voluntary reading is in decline, especially among young people.
Not everyone concurred with the report's conclusions. Pat Schroeder of the Association of American Publishers pointed out that sales of young adult books have never been greater. The President of the Young Adult Library Services Association of ALA, Paula Brehm-Heeger, complained that the definition of "voluntary reading," that included only book reading, was too narrow. Young people today are reading constantly on the Web, and writing too. Good point, I think.
If you read the report in its entirety you will find that it actually contains some good news, along with the bad news that tends to dominate the news accounts and the executive summary. For example, on p. 27 there is a table that shows that for Americans older than 45, voluntary reading has not declined in a statistically significant way since 1992. And on p. 40, I was pleased to learn that young people (ages 15-24) are watching much less TV than their elders. In 2006, people 25 and over spent between 53% to 55% (varies by age group) of their weekday leisure time watching the tube, but 15 to 24-year-olds spent only 42%.
I tend to be skeptical of people who seem to want to see a crisis in reports like this. I think it is probably an overstatement for the head of the NEA to say that "if, at the current pace, American continues to lose the habit of reading the nation will suffer substantial economic, social, and civic setbacks." Still, the report is pretty convincing that more needs to be done to encourage voluntary reading.
So what can be done? The editor of the Albany Democrat-Herald, who editorialized twice on the report, recommends greater use of public libraries. Trouble is, in Linn County, about 32,000 people don't have a public library and have to pay a non-resident fee. No problem, opines the editor: "they don't charge a fee for looking around." Right.
The President of ALA, Loriene Roy,
thinks the answer is more young adult librarians in public libraries, pointing
out that less than half of U.S. public libraries don't employ one. What I didn't
hear is what seems to me to be the obvious solution, which is to bring back
school libraries from their state of neglect in many communities in Oregon and
elsewhere in the U.S. As reported in LTLO last month, the number of teacher
librarians in Oregon schools reached a new low last year. We have a chance to
turn this around if we all get behind the SKILLs
Act which ALA is promoting in the Congress. It would amend the No Child
Left Behind program to strongly encourage every school to have a certified teacher
librarian. What better way to motivate young people to read than to have an
excellent school library in every school. - Jim Scheppke
Technical Assistance: 503-932-1004.
Library Development: 503-378-2525, MaryKay
Dahlgreen, Val Vogt, Darci
Hanning, Ann Reed, Patty
Sorensen, Katie Anderson.
Talking Book and Braille Services: 503-378-5389, Susan
Westin.
Government Research and Electronic Services: 503-378-5030, Robert
Hulshof-Schmidt.
State Librarian: 503-378-4367, Jim
Scheppke.
LTLO Editor: 503-378-2464, Robin
Speer.
Letter to Libraries Online is published monthly by the Oregon State Library. Editorial office: LTLO, Oregon State Library, 250 Winter St. NE, Salem, Oregon 97301-3950, 503-378-2464, editor: Robin Speer.
Letter to Libraries Online is available free of charge and is available only in electronic form on the publications page at the Oregon State Library's homepage: http://www.oregon.gov/OSL. Opinions expressed in the articles are those of the authors and not necessarily those of the Oregon State Library. News items or articles should be sent to Robin Speer, or mailed to LTLO, Oregon State Library, 250 Winter St. NE, Salem, Oregon 97301-3950.
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