A proposal too important to ignore

Dear Readers,

The City Council will hold a public hearing Monday, February 7 at 7:30 p.m. in the council chambers on a proposed ordinance to bond $800,000 to buy and start renovations on the former YMCA property. A separate resolution would authorize City Manager Alan Bergren to negotiate a purchase price with the Chelsea Groton Bank. The price listed in the resolution is $425,000. The total cost of the renovations is expected to total $3 million. No votes can be taken Monday, as the council awaits a recommendation from the Commission on the City Plan.
It is extremely important that the public attends and participates in these discussions. Past meetings devoted in large part to the purchase and renovation of the YMCA have been poorly attended, and were certainly not fully representative of the Norwich community. A proposal of this magnitude deserves serious public discourse by parties on both sides of the issue.
Over the last few weeks there has been extensive coverage of the proposed reuse of the former YMCA building as a “community center”, including today’s report of extensive vandalism only recently discovered. In considering the proposed measures, let us keep in mind that Otis Library is a community center. It provides free meeting space for community organizations, sponsors and promotes a wide variety of programs for all ages, serves as the most active regional site for Literacy Volunteers, and is one of the few forums in the city of Norwich where people of diverse backgrounds gather in a common space. It is not a recreational facility, and there is no question that such a facility would be a community asset. That said, before embarking on another project it seems sensible to ensure the long-term support and stability of an existing, heavily used asset currently providing essential community centered services. That entity is the Otis Library.

I want to share with those of you who are not subscribers a letter I submitted to the Norwich Bulletin. It pertains to an article on the voters' approval of a bond issue to stimulate economic development in the downtown Norwich business district. My comments speak to the optimism reflected in a positive vote, the role that economic factors played in keeping Otis Library part of the downtown ambiance, and the dismal effects of a possible third year of budget reductions. Without resorting to a jeremiad, I hope contributions like this will point out, constructively, the contradictions between pursuing an improved downtown while simultaneously underfunding an existing positive contributor to the city center, the Otis Library:

Your Dec. 30 article “Norwich keeps up fight for downtown” failed to mention Otis Library, a positive attraction built in part with economic development funds.

Norwich citizens expressed their belief in a renewed, economically healthy and attractive city center by supporting a substantial bond issue. It seems contradictory at this juncture to further reduce city support for the library, thus diminishing the library’s capacity to serve the public and provide a venue on Main Street where people feel safe and comfortable. A possible third year of reduced funding will mean — again — fewer hours, fewer resources and fewer reasons to visit the city’s center, not to mention opportunities for the bond to succeed, causing the city center to further deteriorate.

Extended library hours are not the sole prerequisite for a renascent downtown. I firmly believe that making the library more accessible is part of the solution, along with the successful implementation of the downtown bond, adequate recreational facilities and participation of law enforcement, to cite but three examples. I cannot envision how reducing the capacity of the library to serve the public will enhance or help maintain the stability of the community or promote a vibrant city center.

ROBERT D. FARWELL, Director
Otis Library

Libraries and education, briefly stated

I will confine today's post to a brief observation based on Tony Judt's book "Ill Fares the Land" He speaks of the decaying effects of unequal access to resources, and how, under conditions of severe inequality all other desirable goals become hard to achieve. He goes on to note some particulars about education: Under conditions of endemic inequality the permanently underprivileged cannot get a good education, and without that " they cannot hope for minimally secure employment-much less participation in the culture and civilization of their society." Conversely, "better educated populations not only lead better lives, they adapt faster and at less cost to disruptive technical change." The library is part of the solution to the problem of unequal access to education and unhindered access to information. As we think about the the services we provide to the community we need to keep in mind these transcendent roles. The value of empowering our customers and a common focus on providing excellent service cannot be underestimated.

Whither Libraries?

The convergence of planning, budgetary constraints and the prospects of another portentous fiscal year in 2011-2012 (see the recent New London Day article “Norwich Budget Picture is Grim”) has heightened my awareness of the challenges and options confronting public libraries. The challenges, fiscal matters aside, reflect several factors, not the least of them being the expectations of four generations of customers spanning those, to employ a convenient metaphor, raised on the card catalog to 60 million Millennials whose world is fully digitized and who may find no need for traditional library services. We are reminded that our traditional users and the service models designed for their needs are both on the wane, that circulation of analog materials (think books and other hard copy formats) has declined annually since about 1997, and that even notoriously sclerotic bureaucracies at the state and federal level are abandoning their paperwork bulwarks for new entrenchments based on digital forms and correspondence. M.I.T.’s Nicholas Negroponte forecasts the demise of the analogue book in five years, and, one might reasonably extrapolate the disappearance of print repositories not many years hence.
On the other hand, warnings abound about the pernicious results of the decline of print and the ensuing retreat of literacy. Two of my favorite jeremiads are taken from Chris Hedges book “Empire of Illusion: The End of Literacy and the Triumph of Spectacle” and Thomas Frank’s essay “Bright Frenetic Mills” in the December 2010 edition of Harper’s Magazine. Hedges book is deeply discomforting, but I share his concerns and recommend it to those who are disillusioned by the apotheosis of spectacle and other mechanisms that divert us from confronting the economic, environmental, political and moral collapse. A particularly resonant comment for those of us raised in an analog world appears towards the end of the book, “The more we distance ourselves from a literate, print-based world, a world of complexity and nuance, a world of ideas, for one informed by comforting, reassuring images, fantasies, celebrities, and a lust for violence, the more we are destined to implode.” I do not believe that the evolution of digital formats portends the end of the world as we know it, but I do worry over the tangible evidence of a growing preference for the “comfort, reassurance and beauty of illusion.”
Frank is more directly concerned with the decline in quality journalism in its traditional forms, replaced by news gathering motivated by two factors, “what people are searching for on Google and what advertisers might pay to associate themselves with a given topic.” More specifically he fears that “professional news gathering organizations can no longer be supported by the for-profit system.” The digital replacements, the proliferation of tweets and blog posts and general techno-optimism, he opines, obscures what is actually happening in the world:
“So powerful is our desire to believe in the benevolent divinity of the technology that it cancels out our caution…We have trouble grasping that the Internet might not bring only good; that an unparalleled tool for enlightenment and research and transparency might also bring unprecedented down-dumbing; that something that empowers the individual might also wreck the structures that have protected the individual for decades.”
What of the public library’s role in addressing the challenges posed by this tumultuous, fractious environment and competing perspectives?
First, to cite Dr. Steve Matthews, Library Specialist, Utah State Library (USL), Salt Lake City "[p]ublic libraries have NOT figured out that the 21st Century patron does not need 20th Century library services. Unless we want to see brick & mortar libraries go the way of the rotary dial telephone, the transistor radio, and the cathode ray tube, we need to understand the “new” library patron and adapt library services to meet their interests, because they do not appear to have library service “needs” and will not seek services from public libraries!” This rings true, although it does not mean the jettisoning of our traditional formats and patron services. The requests for print materials remains strong, and despite its slow devolution into a hackneyed cliché, there is considerable truth in the observation “everything is not on the Internet.” Neither is it in digital format, and it is certainly not accessible without a degree of literacy and acquired research skills. We cannot assume that the critical thinking skills necessary to separate good information from bad are an integral part of school curricula.

Equally salient, the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation released a sweeping report titled “Informing Communities — Sustaining Democracy in the Digital Age.” which concludes the health of America’s democracy and communities rests on plugging troubling gaps between the nation’s information haves and have-nots. Access to broadband Internet, for example, is a luxury for most low-income households. And that access gap leaves many on the political, social and economic sidelines. To that might be added access to information regardless of format, at no or minimal cost.

These are not definitive answers to my initial query, “Whither Libraries?” and both perceived threats and opportunities are clear. At the moment, there are no simple answers, certainly no one source of information, or one service model supplanting the general commitment to high quality. As our planning continues, and we assess the perspectives offered by Hedges, Negroponte, Frank, Matthews, our patrons, staff and board I look forward to presenting more reports on what we discover and how it informs our thinking.

Planning: For Now and for the Future

Over the past month the library has engaged in the first steps of a new strategic planning process. One of the key components of the planning process is the recognition that the library is serving five distinct generational groups whose needs and expectations bear distinct imprimaturs. To quote Dr. Steve Matthews, Library Specialist, Utah State Library and author of the 21st Century Library Blog:

“Ten years into the 21st Century, public libraries are still predominantly providing “traditional” library services for the “Great Generation” patrons and toddlers who make up a large segment of our users. We also provide services for “Traditional” [Digital Fugitive] patrons, the 76 million “Baby Boomers” many of whom are “Digital Immigrants” … who may need help acquiring information in a digital world. What can/should 21st Century librarians do for them?
Where does this broad spectrum of patrons [Digital Fugitive to Digital Native] fit within the “library service response” framework? Does it? Do we need to revise that framework? How do we span the broad spectrum of services from traditional to digital to meet the needs of these diverse patrons? Do we? Should we? How do we, as a profession, transition from library-centered services to patron [customer]-centered services? What do we need to know, and where do we get the knowledge?”

Pertinent questions indeed. We serve multiple library constituencies, and while all deserve the best services possible the means employed are evolving rapidly. How we provide excellent service which satisfies the diverse requirement of our customers is central to the future of the Otis library and its status as a community asset.

Our Mission

Otis Library Mission Statement
“The Otis Library provides free and open access to information, ideas, and services that anticipate our community’s personal, educational, and professional needs. The library enriches our region by maintaining a safe and welcoming environment and by offering resources that promote lifelong learning.”

Our mission statement mandates that Otis Library create environments where all residents feel safe, smart, and comfortable. These are estimable goals, but not as simple to define as the words may imply. For example, traditionally libraries have been equated with information. Yet designating libraries as “the information place” is limiting and arguably leads to a narrow definition of what libraries and librarians do. We are certainly a repository of information, which librarian Walt Crawford defines as services designed to “bring resources to people for their education, enlightenment and entertainment.” That sounds very much like the work of Otis Library and its staff. To that I would also echo Crawford’s addendum that “we serve as a safety net for the displaced and a primary place where young people learn to love reading and knowledge.” That too describes the Otis Library. Both elements allude to the principal reasons we are on Main Street rather than some leafier thoroughfare. We are situated to stimulate interest in the downtown area, to be accessible by foot and mass transit as well as automobile. Our mission statement also describes a community centered library-a community hub-strategically placed to encourage the economic and cultural renascence of the city center. These individual elements as a whole are the substance of what we are, what we do, how we place ourselves in our surroundings and the lives of our patrons.
Our mission is service to our community in many forms. The niches we fill, the ways in which we measure and incorporate community needs into our planning, and by so doing remain relevant to those we serve reflect both traditional library roles and those required of a responsive, engaged community asset.

Libraries, education, and more

A very brief posting today. During the past week I read several articles that proclaimed the importance of education in a democratic society. One included a quote from Franklin D. Roosevelt, "Democracy cannot succeed unless those who express their choice are prepared to choose wisely. The real safeguard of democracy, therefore, is education." Elsewhere, similar sentiments were expressed in slightly different language. Clearly libraries were not expressly referred to by the late president or the pundits who echoed this theme, but it takes no stretch of the imagination or definition to include them. Yet somehow, without appreciating the irony libraries are excluded from the definition of educational institution when it comes to funding. It would be easy enough to excoriate the officials who determine funding priorities for not recognizing the value of public libraries. There is enough vitriol and incivility available on line and in print to make that sort of response unappealing. The best remedies are positive and proactive. Public libraries "pick up the slack" when school libraries are eliminated, funding for after school programs reduced and alternative sites sought for extracurricular activities. These are cogent reminders of the utility of public libraries. When funds for mandatory summer reading materials disappear the public library fills the void. When children and young adults need a safe after school environment and internet access the library answers both needs. It is equally salient to remind community leaders that libraries, far from isolating themselves from public dialogue and community matters avidly engage in civic culture, be it envisioning a community's future through cooperative long range planning or assessing the impact of new parking regulations on the local business district. There are myriad other ways-adult education, services to new Americans for example- in which libraries contribute to community health and well being, and extend the definition of education. Reminders to that effect are essential and positive examples of the public libraries contributing to the common weal.