Across the Washington region, public libraries have increased their role in the community, hosting myriad meetings in their conference rooms, teaching people to use the latest technological devices and connecting residents with language classes and voter registration services.
The range of users and uses is breathtaking. Although proposals for gorgeous new or renovated library buildings in the District and the wealthier suburbs get the headlines and television airtime, the main challenge lies in the day-to-day operations of this public resource.
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As the region recovers from the Great Recession of the past four years, public library leaders say they are slowly recovering from the budget cuts that reduced their collections, closed their doors on weekends and nights and caused cutbacks in custodial services. The doors might be open longer, but not as long as they were before the economic downturn.
“We’ve been able to restore most of those [reduced] hours,” said Sam Clay, director of Fairfax County libraries. “Over time, our customers really voiced to the powers that be that they don’t like reduced hours, and their voices were heard.”
Library directors are careful to praise the elected officials who hold the purse strings and have to balance the needs of police and fire, economic development, infrastructure and other community services in a time of uncertainty, even in the relatively wealthy Washington area. But just beneath the surface of the team-player talk, the stress of the past few years shows through as directors struggle to replace experienced, full-time professionals with fewer or part-time researchers.
And public demand is as strong as ever, librarians say. Whether measured by circulation size, customer visits to branches or Web sites, or participation in classes, reading programs or information inquiries, people are using their public libraries.
“We’re still facing challenges around unemployment,” said Larry Broxton, spokesman for the Prince George’s County Memorial Library System. “Number one, [patrons] can’t afford Internet access at home, so they come to us. Two, they need job-searching resources.”
The American Library Association reports that a national 2010 study showed that 4.4 million Americans used their libraries for job-related activities, even as budgets shrank. A Pew Charitable Trusts study of 15 urban library systems, not including Washington, noted that library visits rose 6 percent from 2005 to 2011. And if you happened by the Arlington Central Library on June 30, the scorchingly hot day after the derecho storm cut power and phone service in much of Northern Virginia, you would have found 700 people sharing air conditioning, Internet access and power strips.
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