Link to December 10 Wisconsin Dells Events article, "Library to ask Adams County for funding".
Excerpt: The Kilbourn Public Library director will send a letter next year to the Adams County clerk telling the county the library has considerable use from Adams County residents and can reimburse the county for the cost of circulating items to Adams County residents, although it is not required to.
The decision to take action was discussed by the library board at a meeting Thursday.
Kilbourn Public Library gets reimbursed by Sauk, Columbia and Juneau counties for use of the library by rural residents in those counties, but Adams County is an exception because it has a county library system that exempts them from having to pay anything to Kilbourn Public Library.
But Adams County also happens to be part of the South Central Library System, to which Kilbourn Public Library also belongs.
"If they're not in your system, you can say we're not going to serve you, but they're in our system and we aren't going to do that. Definitely we feel like they're our patrons, and we don't want to lose them," Director Cathy Borck told the library board.
She also said last year more than 20,000 items were checked out by Adams County residents. Dell Prairie residents checked out 11,000 items, New Haven residents 4,000 and nearly 3,000 items were checked out by Springville residents, she said.
Adams County contains no "unlibraried" residents, i.e.,contains no residents who are not residents of a municipality (in this case, the county itself) that maintains a public library.
A very timely article as there are other libraries experiencing the same phenomenon.
ReplyDelete