Library Leaders Want Public Input on the Sullivan Center

Apologies for the lapse in posting on this blog. Looking at this month's meetings a month ago, it was listed that the annual meeting was being held on June 18 at Franchesco's. Checking back a couple weeks later and it was still listed as such. Then yesterday's Rockford Register Star ran a story about how library leaders want public input on the Sullivan Center. Apparently the meeting was changed from Franchesco's on the 18th to the 25th at the East Branch. I'm not sure when the switch was made and though it's great that they changed it to a more appropriate day and time, it was confusing to those who wanted to go but saw the previous (incorrect) information. If anyone has information about the meeting day/time switch, please email saveourrockfordlibrary@gmail.com .

A few words on the article--it's wonderful that the library board is seeking public input on the Sullivan Center before proceeding. SOL sees it as a victory that the message of seeking public input before making major library-altering decisions has resonated with the board. The board's new consciousness about the necessity of asking what the public wants and needs is exactly why SOL now stands for Support Our Public Library. Hearing that Rock River's lease was also renewed is another victory, considering it was slated to close, but the outcry was loud enough to make board members reconsider the decision. In these instances, the board is listening to the voices of the community and SOL thanks them for doing so.

Now for a word on the Sullivan Center, Mr. Logli is quoted in the Rockford Register Star article as saying, “I understand there is some concern that program numbers are down. It seems whatever we can do to improve the setting for programs and the type and variety of programs would be just what we need to bring those numbers back up.” It is certainly true that the programming numbers have dropped significantly. The problem with programming is not where the programs are held or necessarily the type of programs being offered, but the unfortunate cease of printed programming advertisements. There are no more paper Explorers and no programming fliers available for patrons to take home--to inform them of upcoming programs and to act as reminders. For patrons who do not have computer access at home--a significant portion of the population--they cannot learn about programs unless they are at the library logged into the digital Explorer in the bottom corner of the library's website. Can you guess how low the computer class attendance is? The real reason for the drop in programming numbers needs to be brought to the attention of the library board. SOL will make sure to check in about July's meeting days and times and post them on this blog. We'll need a strong showing at the next meeting to thank the board for the work they are doing, but also to address these programming concerns.

The last Board Meeting

There is a nice guest column in the Rock River Times by Mike Korn this week that sums up what happened at the April 23 library board meeting. The comment about the examples given for weeded books was well put. After the meeting, a used book seller said that she bought a fairly new beautiful set of Shakespeare books at the used book sale that looked like they had never been checked out. She mentioned that just because a book hasn't been circulated, does not mean it has not been pulled off the shelf and used. The focus on all the outdated medical textbooks made the outcry about the weeding seem silly. (Did anyone see the Bruce Quast cartoon in Sunday's paper?)

A point of clarification from Mike Korn's guest column about the violations of The Open Meetings Act: Logli stated at the meeting that the Open Meetings Act was never violated, but that is simply not true. The link to the act is above for anyone who wants to read it, but the provision that we know for a fact has been broken read as follows, "In addition, a public body that has a website that the full-time staff of the public body maintains shall post notice on its website of all meetings of the governing body of the public body." The Rockford Public Library did not follow this provision, not just once, but multiple times as Rachel stated at the last board meeting.
A staff member brought it up in a monthly meeting beginning last fall (2011) that the incorrect meeting time and location was listed on the website. (The website stated meetings were held at Main at 6pm, when they were actually held at the East branch at 5:30.) During the January board meeting this fact was brought up by several of the public speakers and the information was corrected.
However, the committee meetings were not listed in March on the website. It is suspected that other provisions of the Open Meetings Act may have also been violated (such as the one that states meeting notices must be posted at the location of the meeting and one other location) but this has not been confirmed.
Regardless, it is true that the Open Meetings Act has been violated repeatedly this past year, and yes, Rachel did state that when the board president is the former state's attorney this fact is embarrassing, even unforgivable. "Unforgivable" was perhaps not the correct word choice and "inexcusable" should have been used instead.
After hearing about Daniel Ross receiving threats, it is important to SOL that the dialogue about the library and the library board is civil and does not incite people, so Rachel wishes she could change the adjective "unforgivable," to the more accurate "embarrassing." SOL's mission has been to inform the public about the current situation with the Rockford Public Library and has never been to be adversaries with the library director or board members.

Finally, there was also a wonderful guest column in Sunday's Rockford Register Star by Amy Orvis if you missed it.

Concern about Proposals Being Implemented

There has been some weeding done at the library. No big deal, right? All libraries do weeding. And the books go into the used book shop/ sale and then the money the used books bring in just goes back to the library, right?

What if that's not what was happening?

There are many rumblings about Frank Novak himself doing the weeding. There is a policy in place about what criteria is used to weed books and the policy states that there should be a second opinion given before any books are discarded. There is concern that this procedure is not being followed as it was reported that Frank gave directions to throw books away without letting any staff or the Friends of the Library see. Why the secrecy? Was it because these were perfectly good books?

In the last month, representatives from businesses have been given tours of the top two floors of the Main library.

So the question many of us are asking is this: If the proposals were merely "theoretical" why the secret weeding? Why are there prospective renters looking at the second and third floors? Massive weeding and renting out the 2nd and 3rd floors are both objectives of the proposals. So many people are concerned that Frank is slinking ahead to work to get them implemented.

Link to Open Letter

Here's the link to Andrew Strong's letter that was published in this week's Rock River Times:

http://rockrivertimes.com/2012/02/22/guest-column-open-letter-to-the-mayor-library-board-trustees-and-mr-novak/

E-readers to circulate

Yesterday's paper had an article about how the library will be circulating e-readers.

Some thoughts on the circulation of e-readers... These devices are breakable. A former RPL staff member mentioned that the library loans out laptops to teens for use in the library and that even after a year of this, many of the computers were broken and had missing buttons. (Again, these laptops never left the building! What would happen to them if they did?)

RPL is purchasing 60 Kindles (vs. 10 Sony PRS-T1s). To check out a book from the library one must have an Amazon account. It is worth noting that when checking out an e-book for a Kindle, because one must log onto Amazon, what is being checked out and read is information "on" the Internet. Amazon keeps a record of this information. Library records have always been private and so privacy is compromised with the use of Kindle devices.

Finally, it is likely that like the new Playaview screens, there will be a bright orange label warning patrons that if this device is lost, stolen, or damaged the patron will be responsible to pay a replacement fee of $125 (or more?) It seems as if that may stop a person from checking one out. A person might think, "Hey, that's two weeks of groceries. I can't afford to take the risk." So how many of those Playaviews get circulated? How many e-reader devices will?

Again, we need to tell our library board that the community wants to have input on our public library and how our tax dollars are spent. The meeting is one week away. Please try to show up for next week's meeting-- Monday, February 27 at 5:30pm at the East branch library in the community room. Hope to see you there!

"In Defense of Paper Books"

Posting this link might fuel the SOL is against e-books rumors, but here is a wonderful essay that raises some interesting points. Andre Vltchek's "In Defense of Paper Books" provides some food for thought. Here's the link:
http://www.counterpunch.org/2012/02/07/in-defense-of-paper-books/

Link to Andrew Strong's guest column

There's an excellent guest column by Andrew Strong in this week's Rock River Times in response to Ted Biondo's piece from the Register Star (which the library administration laid out at the board meeting for people to take along with other e-book propaganda). Please check it out:

http://rockrivertimes.com/2012/02/01/guest-column-biondo%e2%80%99s-misconceptions-on-the-purpose-of-the-library/

Board Meeting Tomorrow (Monday)

Just a reminder that the board meeting is tomorrow (Monday) at 5:30pm at the East Branch library. (Please note that it is not at Main as was reported in the Rockford Register Star today. Someone did call Paul Logli to verify the location. It is at East.)

The board has been backpedaling now that the media is asking them questions about these documents. Read them again if you have doubts about the purpose of them. Novak and Logli have stated the board asked Novak to put them together to generate discussion. However, look at the 5th page of the second proposal and you'll read, "I believe this plan has great merit, otherwise I would not be putting it forward for board review and approval." Something is not adding up... which is why we need to all show up to stand against these plans.

Logli has stated the language in the plans is "inartful" but many would argue it is disrespectful and degrading to our hardworking library staff and the Rockford community. The way the plans are written is troubling as the director of our library should have more respect for RPL. Please consider coming to the meeting to help save our library!

Story on WNIJ... with comments from SOL

For those of you who missed this morning's story on WNIJ, here is a link. (It is about a minute longer than the piece that aired so even if you heard it, you may want to listen again and/or read the transcript.)

http://www.wnij.org/post/leaked-document-angers-rockford-public-library-fans

SOL would like to respond to the assertion that the board asked Novak to put together these plans (that aren't plans...???) SOL does not have information as to the context of the first plan, but will try to uncover this information. However, SOL is aware that the board was asked to vote on the second plan at the last board meeting in November. The board, thankfully, did not agree to do so without first reading the plan. But Novak indeed was pushing for its implementation, so the idea that they were intended to be "theoretical" is likely a safe sound bite.

SOL believes that the board and Novak are backpedaling. Our voices are being heard and they can feel our anger. But what would have happened if we had not spoken up? SOL is not so sure that the public would have been invited to have this discussion. Logli states that the plans were made to generate discussion, but if this was true, why were they not made public? Why was the second plan stamped 'confidential'? When, if at all, would the public have been informed? Novak told the board when he gave them the first plan that they would revisit it in the new year. With so much secrecy surrounding the plans and it now being the new year, SOL felt it was our responsibility to the community to unveil the documents and share them with the public.

Even though the board is trying to mollify us, we still need to attend the board meeting, perhaps now more than ever. We are being heard, but we need to show them just how many people stand against these plans. If we back off now, they'll think that it wasn't so important to us. Let's show them how important it is!

News Coverage on the Press Conference

Anyone at Friday's 'press conference' knows that the event that took place was far different than what was reported by the news media. If you only saw the news, you would have no idea that SOL released two confidential, controversial proposals-- which happened and was actual news. Instead, it was reported that SOL had complaints about the move to a 35% allocation for digital material (old news!) and one station reported that the 35% allocation was a proposal! (?) Another station reported that the board meeting will be held on Sunday, January 22 (It is actually on Monday, January 23.) It was sad to see how the truth was contorted to fit into the perimeters of their two minute news story. Watching it you would think that SOL is a bunch of luddites who hated the mere mention of e-readers. For the record, SOL is not against digital readers and actually embraces the new technology. There are much bigger issues at stake--branch closures, staff layoffs, elimination of paper books (here's a visual of how many: imagine all the books at Rockton Center, Montague, Rock River, Lewis Lemon, and the top two floors of Main... now imagine all of those books out of RPL's system!!!)... these are the issues that we tried to bring to light on Friday with the press conference.

Since the news was not reported about the proposals, SOL has scanned copies of both proposals and will post it here on the blog as soon as possible. (Hopefully tomorrow.) People need to read what our public library's director has in mind for the future of the Rockford Public Library. It is terrifying. Stay tuned.

The library does not own its e-books!

When a library buys a paper book, they have what is called “first sale rights” to the book. That means that they can use the book in any way they like within the limitations of copyright law. They can lend the book as many times as they like, they may sell the book when they are done with it, or they may give the book away. In short, as you would expect, they own the book they have purchased. Conversely, when a library “buys” an e-book, what they are actually paying for is a license to that title with limitations set (and changed without notice) by the title’s publishers and by the content management site (OverDrive). Limitations may include the number of times the title can be checked out before the library has to pay for the book again (renew its license) and how many patrons can download the title at the same time (in essence the number of “copies” the library “owns”) and now, after a drastic move by Penguin Publishers last week that disabled Kindles from downloading library-lent Penguin titles, what devices it will allow to access the title. In short, the library is basically borrowing the rights to the title which can be changed, eliminated, or made more expensive to the library at any time.

You don’t have to be a lawyer to see the many problems with this model. Those problems will continue to plague libraries as they work to build digital collections until the courts settle the policies and laws that govern the e-book lending arena. And don’t hold your breath… it’s not going to be any time soon—we’ll be lucky to see reliable regulation in the next 10 years. Until then, libraries have very little control over the content they purchase, as their e-content collections will be at the mercy of any whim that OverDrive (the virtual landlord of their e-book collection), Amazon, and any publisher may have.

 OverDrive has virtually monopolized the market of providing digital content to libraries. 

What happens when one company monopolizes a market that has little-to-no regulation, of yet?  We all know what happens... they raise rent.  And what happens if that company were to fail?

These are serious, real concerns, which is why we need a large showing at the press conference on Friday morning, January 13. It will be at 9:30am and is scheduled to be held in front of the Main library at 215 N. Wyman St. (Check back with this site to make sure the location has not changed due to the weather.) The posts on this site will become more frequent. Please stay tuned.

Where Is the Public Input?

Rockford Public Library's Executive Director, Frank Novak, stated that public libraries are phasing out print books. However, according to the American Library Association (ALA), most public libraries plan to devote between 8 percent and 10 percent of their total collection budget to digital material by 2016. This is significantly lower than the 34 percent our library is currently allotting. The question raised previously was do our city’s demographics reflect the need to spend 34 percent of our collection budget on ebooks. There is an even bigger question that needs to be asked­— where was the public input before making allocations for our collection budget?

Neither the library board of directors nor the administration have asked library patrons to participate in any kind of survey about how many people own ereaders and if patrons want to see an increase in the digital collection budget. A public library is a democratic institution and, therefore, should ask public opinion before launching into something of this size. Remember, most libraries are planning to spend 8 percent to 10 percent of their collection budget on digital materials by 2016. No one is denying a national trend toward ebooks, but the decision to move to 34 percent is permanent and appears out of touch with Rockford Public Library cardholders.

More than 70 percent of Rockford Public School students are on free or reduced lunch. For those of us who fall into that lower socioeconomic status, an ereader is not affordable. Some people do not have the money to buy food for their children, much less an electronic device that costs around $100. But we don't know how many people own ereaders in Rockford. Such a poll has not been done.

The only way any of us can find out is by polling the public. For a democratic institution, we should expect nothing less than an invitation for public input.

34% of our library budget going to electronic books?

On January 18, 2010, the Rockford Public Library reduced its hours, a decision many of us are still trying to recover from. No longer are we able to visit our library in the morning but two days a week, and only the East Branch is open six days. We went from being able to visit the library on Mondays from 9 a.m.-9 p.m. to noon-8 p.m., or not at all if we intended to visit Main. And what about the hack job they did to Lewis Lemon’s hours? (Read: In half. They were cut in half.)

The library is currently setting aside $400,000 for electronic digital and audio books. $400,000 on materials that only a percentage of our city will have access to. We have no idea how many Rockford library cardholders own eReaders, but we do know our community is 63.29 percent low income. It seems safe to assume that very few of those of us who fall into that 63.29 percent own an electronic device that costs a minimum of $79. Of course, it is not likely that everyone who falls into the other 36.71 percent owns one. Many elderly probably do not, as well as people who find comfort in the feel and smell of a paper book. Of course, this could turn the corner into a whole discussion of eReaders vs. paper books, one that doesn’t pertain to this discussion at all. The rising use of eReaders is not the problem.

It is true that the demand for digital media is rising, but so is its accessibility outside of the library. Amazon.com now offers a Kindle Owner’s Lending Library, where owners can choose from more than 1,000 books they are able to borrow for free. That’s more than 1,000 free books that are only accessible to people with the income to afford an eReader. The rest of us have to contend with a cut in the rest of the collection — a 27.4 percent cut from last year’s allocation.

Rockford’s unemployment rate is 13.4 percent, much higher than the state (10 percent) and national (9.1 percent) averages. Our crime rates continue to soar. Where is our saving grace? It is the library, that wonderful institution that creates educated communities by promoting self-learning, lifelong learning, and self-improvement, levels the playing field for all city residents regardless of income, age, race, religion, gender or ability. And yet, the doors to this all-important institution continue to be locked more often than not; our library’s hours of operation are significantly shorter than smaller area libraries such as the North Suburban District Library. Our library offers computer classes, both conversational English and Spanish classes, food safety classes, and classes on how to pay for college. These programs can help us build job skills, something we need more of, not less.

On September 10, Paul Logli was the keynote speaker at the Rockford Public Schools Parent Leadership Conference. He discussed the problem of the digital divide. He then mentioned the growing importance of eReaders and a time in the near future when paper books would be obsolete. He said he saw a future where libraries would go completely digital. It is important to note that Mr. Logli is currently the president of the library's board of directors.

Right now, our city needs more hours, services and programming, not electronic resources. There may be a time in the future when it is time to increase our budget for these resources, but it seems rather misguided to do so now, when so many of our residents need the library to be opened more hours so we have more time to search for a job so someday we can afford to buy eReaders, too.