'Bookless' in San Jose is No Cause for Celebration

Budget Woes Prompt Erosion of Public Jobs, With a Heavy Toll in Silicon Valley. (The New York Times, 2/19/2012)

Excerpt:    The smell of new carpet still lingers in the children’s section of the gleaming new Bascom Library and Community Center here, where signs promise “picture books” and “story time.” But the low, easy-to-reach wooden bookshelves are empty, along with the rest of the shelves in the state-of-the-art, 40,000-square-foot building.

The bookless library stands behind a locked chain-link fence with signs warning of 24-hour video surveillance, one of four libraries the City of San Jose has built but cannot afford to open.