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PROV. COMM. LIBRARY WORKERS WILL BE PAID DURING UPCOMING CLOSING, BUT FOREGO PENSION BENEFITS FOR 1 YEAR

7/29/2012

THE ROCHAMBEAU LIBRARY on Hope Street is one of nine libraries to close one week in September.

By BRIAN C. JONES
Rhode Island Library Report

PROVIDENCE – (July 29) – The one-week shutdown planned by the Providence Community Library (PCL) in September is a direct result of the city’s decision to cut $205,000 in funds the nine-branch system.

But the closing itself won’t save the library money.

In fact, during the scheduled shutdown of the state’s largest library system – from Sept. 10 through Sept. 15 – workers will still get their regular paychecks.

Instead, the savings will come mostly from a loss of pension benefits for one year for all 65 employees. On average, workers will forgo more than $2,000 each in pension benefits, as well as the long-term loss of investment income the contributions would have earned.

If the workers are still being paid, why not keep the library open?

One reason is that the closing will give most workers week off, the equivalent of an extra week of paid vacation, in exchange for their substantial pension giveback.

But there’s another reason, too.

A library spokesman said that the shutdown is intended to show city government – and the public – the consequences of budget cutbacks, especially if reductions continue into the future, something officials say will have a far more drastic effect on the library.

“You cannot hide the issue from the public,” said Steve Kumins, the library’s development director. “It’s important that next year we get the money back.”

An official of the library workers’ union – which reluctantly agreed to the pension giveback – said that without a shutdown, the retirement concession by the library and its workers might go largely unnoticed by the public, the administration of Mayor Angel Taveras and the city council.

“We had to put the message out that this is not something we can do year after year,” said Karen McAninch, business agent of the United Service and Allied Workers of Rhode Island. “If the cut is something invisible, the city is going to say ‘Good, you can live without it.’ We didn’t want this to be a permanent cut.”

A Closing - And A Message

ORDINARILY, A SHUTOWN brought on by budget cuts would be expected to achieve its savings by the workers’ loss of wages. And that’s what could have happened if the library had gone ahead with an alternative plan, closing for four to five weeks, during which workers wouldn’t have been paid.

But that’s not how this closing is being structured.

The workforce – administrators as well as union members – will give up the PCL’s year-long contribution to its 401k-style retirement plan, for a savings of between $150,000 and $160,000. Most of the remaining shortfall will be made up by the elimination of one job.

Meanwhile, the workers will be paid for five “vacation” days, during which most employees won’t have to work while the library’s nine branches are closed. Some maintenance workers will remain on the job, and take their five days off later.

SMITH HILL Library earlier this year.

Closing the nine-branch system, even for a week, is an ironic step for the Providence Community Library, which grew out of a protest movement to stop the permanent closing of neighborhood branches when they were run by the Providence Public Library.

Indeed, in the three years since the PCL was established as non-profit organization and assigned management of the nine branch libraries by the city, the PCL has emerged as the state’s largest library system, running a variety of educational and cultural programs for children and adults and expanding free Internet computer service to patrons.

For example, in 2011, the Community Library counted 56,034 participants in various programs, about double that of the Cranston Public Library, which had next highest program attendance, 28,830, according to figures compiled by the state Office of Library and Information Services.

Also, the PCL says in its own 2011 annual report that it has added 50 Internet computers since it took over the branch libraries in July, 2009, with a current total of 183 computers, which logged 213,261 users or computer sessions in 2011. By contrast, the next highest user total was 106,489, by the Lincoln Public Library, which has 43 terminals.

Weighing The Options, None Welcome

DESPITE ITS SUCCESS, the library says its finances have remained precarious, dependent mainly on city and state support.

Earlier this year, the Taveras administration proposed a 10 percent cut in municipal funds, or $355,000, as the city struggled to avoid bankruptcy in the fiscal year which began in July.

Library leaders said at the time that the system’s nearly $4.8-million budget was already a barebones spending plan, and they predicted that the drop in city funds could have forced the branches to close up to nine weeks.

In response, the city council and the Taveras administration agreed June 5 to shift funds to the library from elsewhere in the city budget restoring $150,000, thus paring the reduction to $205,000.

OLD ENTRANCE to the Rochambeau Library.

At the time, the change was praised by the PCL, which said that “we are hopeful that with this restoration we will be able to continue provide library services with minimal disruption to the people of Providence.”

But on July 19, the Community Library announced the one-week closing, along with the suspension of pension contributions.

“PCL and its employees hope that this great financial sacrifice by all of PCL’s employees, together with the closing of the libraries for one week, will be sufficient to address this budget shortfall,” the library said on its Website.

WHILE THE IMPLICATION was that the shutdown would contribute to the plugging the budget hole, officials said later in interviews with the Rhode Island Library Report that the workers would be paid during the shutdown.

In fact, after a reporter for the Rhode Island Library Report asked questions on the assumption that the closing amounted to a staff furlough, Kumins telephoned later to explain that the workers would be paid the equivalent of five vacation days and were “not being technically laid off.”

The bulk of the savings are to be achieved by a one-year suspension of the contributions that the library system makes to employee 401k retirement plans. The library pays the equivalent of 4 percent of each worker’s salary into the retirement plans, and for those employees who chose to invest their own funds, the library matches those, up to another 2 percent of the worker’s pay.

Thus, someone earning $30,000, and putting his or her own pay into a retirement fund, could see a lost pension contribution of 6 percent, or $1,800. Actual amounts will differ, since they are pegged to each individual’s wages – a larger amount for someone with a higher salary than for a worker at the bottom of the pay scale. The system-wide payroll is about $2,781,000, so the average loss could be more than $2,000 per worker.

To compensate for the loss of pension benefits, the PCL and the union agreed to uninterrupted pay through the one-week shutdown, with the employees gaining another week of paid vacation. Based on the PCL’s payroll figures reported to the state of about $2,781,000, a week’s salary averages more than $800 per worker. Thus, workers will lose much more in pension contributions than they get to keep during the shutdown week.

According to Kumins, another alternative would have been a system-wide shutdown of a number of weeks, during which employees would not be paid.

But a shutdown of that duration was seen as too disruptive to library system’s patrons – in 2011, the library reported a total of 676,924 visits.

Kumins said the PCL believes the city must restore the original contribution to the library system, and increase funding in future years, if the system is to carry out its mission to provide library services to the city’s neighborhoods.

McAninch, the union leader, agreed, saying employees cannot be asked to making such sacrifices year after year, nor is it realistic to expect fundraising to supply all of the money. If municipal funding isn’t restored, she said, the library system will be forced to take steps more “draconian” than a one-week closing.

The closing is being timed to have a minimal impact, officials said, especially on children who depend on the library not only for its books, computer access and other services, but as a safe alternative to time on city streets.

The Sept. 10 to 15 closing comes with Providence schools in their third week after the summer break. Still, according to the academic calendar posted on the school department’s Website, schools will be closed for students on Sept. 11, which is a state primary election day as well as a professional development day for school staff. (The PCL branches are closed on Sundays, according to posted hours on its Website).

A WIDE REACH
The Providence Community Library's
Locations In Nine Neighborhoods

Fox Point Library, 90 Ives St.

Knight Memorial Library, 275 Elmwood Ave.
Mount Pleasant Library, 315 Academy Ave.
Olneyville Library, 1 Olneyville Square.
Rouchambeau Library, 708 Hope St.
Smith Hill Library, 31 Candace St.
South Providence Library, 441 Prairie Ave.
Wanskuck Library, 3 Veazie St.
Washington Park Library, 1316 Broad St.

Libraries - and the Arab Spring

7/14/2012

Dave Bloss

Dave Bloss, our partner at the Rhode Island Library Report, is on a temporary assignment overseas and following the foreign media. As he comes across items about libraries, we’ll pass them along here at The Library Line blog.

A Saudi Arabian commentator zeroed in on a question asked by a teenager about libraries to explain the forces at work in the “Arab Spring.”

Abdulateef al-Mulhim, the commentator, said the same desire for knowledge and understanding to be found in a library has empowered the reform movement in Tunisia, Egypt and other countries.

     It’s a point missed, he said, by some Arab “think tanks,” which have attributed the uprisings to Western countries. But he said a key point is to be found in the question asked by 14-year-old Basel Al Thunayan, who wondered why some Arab countries have far fewer libraries than Israel.

     “This is a billion-dollar question that should have been asked by Arab thinkers, rather than a 14-year-old boy from Saudi Arabia,” Abdulateef al-Mulhim wrote. “The presence of many libraries reflect how the people behave and how educated they are and how advanced a particular country is. Libraries are the place to read about others and to think on your own.”
Here's a link to the full article:

The commentary appeared June 14 in the Arab News, in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, and was picked up by the Website of Al Arabiya News Channel in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. According to his LinkedIn profile, Abdulateef al-Mulhim is a former Royal Saudi Navy commander, who attended the State University of New York Maritime College and also writes for Al Yaum, of Dammam, Saudi Arabia.

A hungry reader

7/13/2012

Dave Bloss writes from Libya of a new take on the thirst for knowledge.

His colleague, Khaled Abu Al-khair, is a veteran Jordanian print and online journalist, who values reading. When he was just 9 years old, Khaled was burrowing into works of William Faulkner – and reading the great Southern author’s work in the original English.

Dave reports that Khaled made this comment recently:

“Sometimes I wish I was an ant in a library and literally could eat the books up.”

The Library Report takes the liberty of assuring librarians everywhere that the use of the word “literally” here is strictly figurative, and that wherever Khaled goes to slake his hunger for books, the materials he devours will be returned in their original condition.

Dave and Khaled are in Libya for a project sponsored by the Institute for War and Peace Reporting, to train journalists in emerging democracies. They are meeting with editors and reporters in their Libyan newsrooms to share practical skills and explore increasing coverage of stories in less-populated areas of the country.

REED: Libraries are "the future," and will play key roles as providers of Internet access, reliable facts and 'common ground.'

7/8/2012

By Brian C. Jones
Rhode Island Library Report

CRANSTON – July 5, 2012 – In a recent visit to the Pawtucket Public Library, U.S. Senator Jack Reed, D-RI, was surprised to see a long line of patrons waiting to use the library’s free, Internet-connected computers. Reed asked why.

“These people are all looking for work,” a librarian said, explaining that employers now want job-seekers to apply on-line.

It was a sharp contrast with Reed’s memories of growing up in working-class Rhode Island, when someone wanting a job simply walked into a factory and filled out a form on a clipboard.

And it reinforced Reed’s view that libraries now are more essential than previously in American history.

“Libraries might be playing a more important role today than they ever have in our country,” says Reed, who Capitol Hill’s leading advocate for libraries. But Reed also says library supporters need to convince skeptics that libraries are relevant in the digital age.

There are many reasons that libraries still have an important place in America’s cities and towns, he says, beginning with their provision of free computer and Internet access.

For people who cannot afford a home computer or an Internet subscription, libraries are the place where they can connect, he says. And that will be increasingly vital as the Internet serves as a gateway to more aspects of life, for example, the new national health care program’s insurance exchanges, and university courses provided on-line.

BUT THERE'S MUCH MORE, Reed says, including the role that librarians can take in countering one downside of the digital revolution: misinformation, partial information, slanted information pouring into computers from cyberspace.

Reed sees librarians as becoming expert guides to reliable information, neutral arbiters who can point patrons toward reliable sources and broadening the outlooks people who may have developed tunnel vision by consuming only media reinforcing their personal viewpoints.

Libraries also will continue to occupy a special place in American life, as gathering spots where people, regardless of wealth, are welcome.

“I think the libraries are, first of all, common ground,” Reed says. “And we are losing more and more of our common ground: a place you go, a community place, a place where you actually see people. That's an important role that's often understated.”

REED MADE the comments in an interview with the Rhode Island Library Report at his Cranston office, not far from Cranston’s Central library on Sockanosset Cross Road.

It was a day after he’d marched in July Fourth parades. Relaxed and down-to-earth in his conversation, Reed nevertheless was formally dressed, Washington style, in a blue-gray suit, and blue-and-white striped tie. Shortly afterwards, he was planning to fly back to the capital, to rejoin his wife, Julia Hart Reed, and their daughter, Emily.

"Libraries are, first of all, common ground, And we are losing more and more of our common ground: a place you go, a community place, a place where you actually see people. That's an important role that's often understated.”

Scattered around his office were models of military aircraft. Reed is well regarded as a military expert. A West Point graduate, he’s one of a dwindling number of national lawmakers who actually served in the military, in his case, as an Army Ranger and paratrooper.

But Reed also is the leading sponsor in Congress of legislation supporting libraries, a role underscored this past April, when he was honored by two national groups.

The American Library Association declared Reed an honorary member, the organization’s top award, given sparingly to advocates such as the late U.S. Sen. Claiborne Pell, Reed’s predecessor; Microsoft founder and philanthropist Bill Gates; and entertainer and reading advocate Oprah Winfrey.
For a second time, the American Association of School Librarians presented Reed its Crystal Apple, which singles out those who have had a “significant impact” on school libraries. Reed was similarly honored in 1994 and is the only two-time recipient.

Among key pieces of legislation with Reed’s fingerprints is the Museum and Library Services Act, crafted originally by Pell and reauthorized under Reed’s watch in 2003 and 2010. Rhode Island libraries and museums have received $15 million in grants from that program, according to a Reed news release.

Reed engineered inclusion of $28.6 million for school libraries and literacy programs as part of the 2012 Omnibus Appropriations Bill. In 2001, he authored the Improving Literacy Through School Libraries program, to train school librarians and to buy books and computers. He also crafted the Librarian Act, which cancels Perkins student loans for librarians who have master’s degrees and work in low income areas.

NOW 62, Reed says his passion for libraries began when he was growing up in Cranston, the son of a school custodian. He would walk two miles from his family’s home to the Auburn branch of the Cranston Public Library, so he could read books and work on school assignments.

“It was on the corner of Woodbine Street and Park Avenue,” Reed recalled. “You walked up the front steps, and you walked in and the librarian was there to greet you. It was constructed as a big house, probably in the 1890s, and the books were all up in the shelves, and you would go up and get the books, and it was great.”

Reed visits transported him into new worlds and now seem like an idyllic scene in a Norman Rockwell painting. But he acknowledges there have been big changes since then: the Auburn branch has moved to new quarters on Pontiac Avenue, and, in general, most libraries no longer resemble “your grandmother’s library.”

Now, libraries lend electronic books, have banks of computers hooked up to high-speed Internet connections, and patrons go to libraries not just to browse through old issues of Life magazines (a Reed pastime when he was at Harvard law school) or to cool down in an air conditioned reading room. They go to switch careers, learn a language and seek government services.

Not everyone realizes this, he says.

“I think a lot of people say: Oh, well, that’s Andrew Carnegie (the philanthropist who sponsored libraries), and that’s taking a book out, and we don’t do that anymore,” says Reed, who supplies his own instant rebuttal: “No, it’s the future. And we have to do much, much more.”

"If you can teach a child to use a library, then stand back. Because that person throughout their lives will have access to the information they need, will have an inquiring mind, will be able to adapt better."

Libraries are one answer to the much-debated wealth gap in the United States, as the divide between the incomes of the rich and the middle and lower classes becomes more pronounced.

“If you have this separation, not only on income, but access to information, you’re going to have not only an unproductive economy,” Reed says, “but you are also going to have a society that doesn't, you know – it doesn't work well.

REED SAYS LIBRARIES need “continuous advocacy,” and he credits both library professionals in Rhode Island, as well as volunteer supporters, with creating strong backing for the state’s libraries. But the fight to maintain libraries has been long-standing.

When he was first in Congress, as a member of the House of Representatives from 1991 to 1996, school librarians would send Reed samples of books still on their shelves, stamped “ESEA – 1965” – signaling they were subsidized by the original Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965. Thus, 30 years later, those same books continued telling students that the Soviet Union was an ardent foe of the United States, even though by 1991 the USSR had ceased to exist.

The Rhode Island Library Report , which is working to create a unique team of professional journalists to cover Rhode Island libraries, asked Reed about efforts by journalists and librarians to work together, since both newspapers and libraries face similar challenges from new technology and strained finances.

It’s impossible to predict what new models will emerge during a period of “unpredictable change,” Reed says. In some instances, journalists might try to replicate the work of newspapers on the Web, while in other cases, libraries may step in to provide community news provided by now-closed newspapers.

One of the services librarians may offer, Reed suggested, could be to mitigate an unwelcome byproduct of the Internet revolution: one-sided, partisan news.

“In the old media there was always a journalistic effort and a factual standard and a sort of principled approach to providing both sides of the story, different viewpoints,” Reed says. If that’s lost, “the intellectual integrity that librarians bring to the process is something we can’t lose. It’s not heralded enough; we can’t lose it.”

LIBRARIES WILL FLOURISH, Reed says, because the need is both historic and on-going.

“I’m optimistic because I just sense there is such an inherent quest for knowledge by everyone,” Reed says, recalling his visit to the Pawtucket library, which despite having to fight tough economic issues like many urban libraries, was “jam-packed with people.”

“They found their way there,” he says, “and if we keep those doors open, they’ll find their way there.”

Unchanged, Reed says, is the impact that a library can have on a student’s developing mind:

“If you can teach a child to use a library, then stand back. Because that person throughout their lives will have access to the information they need, will have an inquiring mind, will be able to adapt better.

“But if, you know, they don’t have access to libraries, they don’t know they exist, they’ve had poor experiences with them – a huge resource in their life is going to be lost forever.”

Libraries in the 21st Century: A conversation with Senator Jack Reed

7/7/2012

"If you can teach a child to use a library, then stand back. Because that person, throughout their life, will have access to the information they need, will have an inquiring mind, will be able to adapt better.”
- Senator Jack Reed, July 5, 2012

Reed, Capitol Hill's leading advocate for libraries, says they may be playing a more important role today than in the past.

This is a transcript of an interview by the Rhode Island Library Report with U.S. Senator Jack Reed, D-RI, July 5, 2012, in his office at 1000 Chapel View Rd, Cranston. The reporters were Brian C. Jones and Jody McPhillips. The digital recording was transcribed by Jones, with minor editing for clarity.

BRIAN JONES
This year you received the American Library Association's top honor of being an honorary member. Very few people get into that club. And you won your second Crystal Apple from school librarians (the American Association of School Librarians). Obviously you are regarded as a top person by people in this field. What brings you, for so long and so successfully, to this interested in libraries?

SENATOR JACK REED
Well, libraries always have been a huge part of my life. I can remember as a kid going up to the Auburn public library on Park Avenue – which is now, I think, demolished, since they built new libraries – but going in there and just spending hours just fascinated and literally transported, figuratively transported, into different worlds. And that was reading as youngster. And then now, as a member of the Senate, recognizing the central roles – in fact, libraries might be playing a more important role today than they ever have in our country.

And this lesson was brought home to me, just graphically. I went up about, oh, about six months ago to the Pawtucket Library, and I walked in and, you know, we looked around and there were some few people reading in the collections, and we went to the computer room, and there’s there a line, waiting their turn at the computer. And I looked at the librarian, and I said: Everyone’s just checking their e-mail? And he said: No. The only way you can apply for a job now is on-line. These people are all looking for work. And when I was a kid, and you wanted to apply for a job, you went down to the factory, filled out the clipboard, handed it back and waited for the phone call, or the message.

So, just as a way to be a part of the workplace, libraries are playing a critical role. They are going to play a critical role in literacy and adult education. They are already doing that, but they will do it more. They are going to, also, I think, be a place where, as we roll out healthcare reform, people need the information, people need the access to a Website, to make a choice for the health exchange.

You know libraries, they’ve got the computers. One of the things that we've done in Rhode Island, and again a tribute to a lot of great local leaders, the OSHEAN network [part of Broadband Rhode Island], they've put in, I think, 700 computers in 70 different libraries, so that there would be broadband access for people. And we’re talking now about middle and lower income people, who can't afford the kind of the price of service in their home or a sophisticated computer in the home.

So libraries, they are future, really. And I think a lot of people say: Oh well, that's the past, that’s Andrew Carnegie, and that’s going and taking a book out, and we don't do that anymore. No, it's the future. And we have to do much, much more. And so I’ve spent a lot of time in Washington working hard to make sure that we have some support for local libraries.

JONES
Where does the federal funding for libraries stand at this point? Has it been level-funded, Senator?

SENATOR REED
It’s basically level-funded. The big initiative we undertook, and this was something I that I helped draft in the Library and Museum Act back a few years ago, is that the libraries support – there’s a technical and support provision, which provides resources – that's level funded, currently, in both the President’s budget and what we're trying to do. I would argue we could do much more, and it's very efficient. But if we can hold on to this funding, at least we've can help update technology.

And there’s an important aspect to this, often overlooked: help professional development of librarians. Because, once again, now, this is not, you know, your grandmother's library, where you go in and you go through the card catalog and find a card. The librarians get questions about: Well, I’m looking for a job. How to find this material? And you have to develop librarians.

And it’s also important, another aspect, is the school libraries. Because we are we're working on the Elementary and Secondary Education Act arena, both the budget and the authorization, to provide resources for school libraries. They’re often the first thing that's cut. And I found this out when I was in Congress in the 1990s.

And again, one of the reasons that I've done pretty well is I just generally just try to follow what Senator (Claiborne) Pell did, and if you did that you're pretty successful. So he, of course, was the great leader in all these issues.

But back in the 1990s, when I was in the House, and I was working hard on libraries, school library education, the librarians would send me these books, these old books, talking about – now this is the 1990s – about how the Soviet Union was our great threat. Of course, the Soviet Union had collapsed, didn't exist. But these were on the shelves as school library books. But many of them were stamped “ESEA-1965.” The first Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965 provided significant resources to buy books. They were still on the shelves, 30 years later, out of date, many of them. And so we started working, and said: Well, we've got to update this. And now it's happened, of course, with computers and e-books, we’ve sort of leaped over just replacing books.

But it's not just public libraries, it's also school libraries. And, frankly, my basic premise, again after all I've experienced, if you can teach a child to use a library, then stand back. Because that person, throughout their life, will have access to the information they need, will have an inquiring mind, will be able to adapt better. But if they don't have access to libraries, they don't know they exist, they’ve had poor experiences with them, a huge resource in their lives is going to be lost forever.

JONES
Things are changing, obviously, people don’t read don’t read the way they did, or in the form that they did, and especially, as you alluded to, the whole electronic book revolution. So, then, what does become the role of the library, beyond providing some computer access to people who otherwise can't afford it? What other role can the library play, or should it play?

SENATOR REED
Well, I think the libraries are, first of all, common ground, and we are losing more and more of our common ground: a place you go, a community place, a place where you actually see people. That's an important role, that's often understated.

The new technology is both enabling and disabling. And, again, I talked about the need for librarians to be well-trained. Because one of the problems I see with this new electronic media is you can create your own virtual world. You can have only the Websites you like. There's no intermediary who can say: No, no, no, you don't understand: that's totally erroneous, that if you want a good reference point, this is an accurate reference. Where you get that? Well, one place you could get that is a well-trained librarian, who does not have, as they say, an ax to grind; just: You are looking for information about a particular program; well, then I recommend you go to this source, it's very reliable etc. It's that validation, that expertise, that can be so important.

So, the libraries, again, I think have a much more important role going forward, as much as they did in the past. And libraries always, and one of the things that, the great philanthropist Andrew Carnegie did, is he decided to put libraries practically everywhere, because he had this vision that if you were to open knowledge to every American – not just the affluent, who can afford the sophisticated computers and things like that, but to everybody – then this country is going to take off. And if you have this separation, not only on income, but access to information, you’re going to have not only an unproductive economy, because Andrew Carnegie I think was pretty shrewd about – again, I think he was a pretty devout capitalist among many other things – but you're not going to have a good economy. But you are also going to have a society that doesn't, you know, it doesn't work well. So, again, libraries I think are, you know – it's something that we can't neglect as an anachronism.

JONES
At every level of government, people wrestle with it, though, especially at the local level, at the state level, which, in Rhode Island, gives a lot of funding, which is dependent and tied into what the local cities and towns are able to do. And then, obviously, there's a big fight going on federally about all government spending. How do you convince people at every level, Senator, that they either maintain or increase spending, when it's so easy to cut the libraries as the first easy, low-hanging fruit?

SENATOR REED
It’s continuous advocacy that you have to undertake. Because, one of the things about libraries is, you can make cuts so: We won't buy books this year; we've got plenty of books. That's okay, but five years from now, when the books are all are out of date, and the library roof is leaking, etc., that's when: Oh, well, we can’t afford to do anything now. So you have to be an advocate.

The other thing you have to do, too, because I don't think you can ever get away from making the case, on sort of dollars and cents – and I go back to my example of becoming part of workforce. Today, you can't be engaged in looking for work unless you have access to the computer. For thousands of people in Rhode Island, the library is the place. So, this is not just a: You can go read some magazines, and, you know, take a nap in the air conditioning. This is about: How can I get a job? How can I keep the job? How can I update my skills? If my employer tells me: You know, there's this on-line course, which is excellent, which would help you. Where do you get it? Well, you can go to the library and ask the librarian for some help.

You know, one of the things that's happening now in higher education – and this goes, too, to how do we make things more efficient – and I would say libraries are a very, very efficient allocation of resources. You know, we are not buying everybody a computer, and we are not getting everybody free Internet service; but what we're doing is making available on a community basis.

MIT, for example, is putting most of their courses on-line. So if you’re a young student, and you want to do something to supplement your education, or you want to see more of this – you’re a worker and you want to upgrade your skills – you can go in and get this course on-line.

JONES
The library you mentioned at the beginning that you went to when you were growing up in Cranston, what was the name that, again?

SENATOR REED

It was the Auburn public library. It was on the corner of Woodbine Street and Park Avenue in Cranston. It was an old house. You walked up the front steps, and you walked in, and the librarian was there to greet you. It was constructed as a big house, probably in the 1890s, and the books were all up in the shelves, and you would go up and get the books, and it was great. And then, subsequently, they built two new branches in Cranston, one here on Sockanosset Cross Road. I don't know if they demolished the building, but that was my first library.

JONES
How far did you have to walk to get from your home to the library?

SENATOR REED
It was about two miles. I had a friend that lived on Woodbine Street, so often I could, before I visited him, I could go up into the library. It was one of those things where you are probably in seventh or eighth grade, you were given those projects you had to do, library research, and you could go into the library and do that. But it was, you know, thinking back now, it was sort of the great American life of Norman Rockwell: you could walk up the steps to this old wooden building with the library, and get the books out. It wasn't that long ago, but it seems like it was that long ago.

And then I can remember when I was at Harvard, at the law school, I would study a lot at the Radcliffe library, which consisted of reading old volumes of Life magazine – that was because I was such a great law student. Libraries can be distracting as well as good places to study. But it was out of the way. The law school library was so frenetic – I mean everyone was just so wrapped up, and I was about 28 or 29, I was much older than my classmates, I’d served for 12 years in the Army. So, I went over to the Radcliffe library, which was much more sort of quiet and a little more collegial, and, you know, did little torts and then Life magazine.

JONES
Rhode Island has a lot of libraries, and a lot of, frankly, goodwill toward libraries right now. Why?

SENATOR REED
Because there’s a personal connection for most Rhode Islanders to a library. All my contemporaries, growing up, they used the same library. They had to do the project at school, just like I did. I think that the other thing, frankly, is we have just a wonderful cadre of librarians and library supporters, people who are active in their community, who have been volunteers of libraries, etc., and they are community leaders. So, yeah, we have that. And, you know, I would suspect if you went across the United States that you’d see similar situations, where people have some close connections to their local libraries.

The problem, of course, is translating that into the resources and appropriate programs at every level. And, again, it’s from going out and visiting these things, I think a lot of people have the notion, because they’ve lost track of what the libraries are, that these are sort of, they are old institutions, and that was in the 1950s or 1850s, and they don’t realize how vital a role they’ll play in our economy.

JONES
Are you optimistic about their future?

SENATOR REED
I’m optimistic, because I just sense there is such an inherent quest for knowledge by everyone. When you go into a Pawtucket library, which is, again, fighting like many urban libraries, tough economic issues, and you find it jam-packed with people – they’ve found their way there. And they’ll find – if we keep those doors open, they’ll find their way there.

And it isn’t frivolous, this is all part of learning something, and again, of participating in the market. And also, I think, stressing over and over again, everyone wants efficiency. When we have a significant amount of digital material, college courses on-line, technical courses on-line, access to it, etc., you’re going to need a couple of things. One, you’re going to need the hardware and software in the library, the computers. But I think, as I said before, you’re going need someone who can give you advice objectively about what’s terrible, what’s a gimmick, and that’s where librarians – well-trained, professionally-developed librarians – can play a critical role.

We always respect them. They are not sending you only to the books that they like. It’s: What are you looking for? Here’s the range. Let me suggest that has been very useful to many people. That help is invaluable.

JODY McPHILLIPS
There’s just one more area I’d like to get into, which is of particular interest to us (at the Rhode Island Library Report). We’ve discovered that there is a growing convergence between the old-style media and librarians. We have commonality of interests. Both industries are really shaken up by the advent of the computer age. What do you think about that? Do you think that is a good partnership, or maybe one that’s got some potential problems down the line? The idea, for example, that in some towns, where the newspapers have collapsed, the library has taken over newsletters and has actually has started to take on a news-gathering job. Whereas, in other places, journalists are forming kind of partnerships with different libraries, for different reasons.

SENATOR REED
I think you’re at this moment of extraordinarily dynamic and unpredictable change, and you’re going to see different models rise and fall very quickly. Some will have the attraction, and some will work. You know, we’ve been there before. Not recently. I think we have technologies that evolved out of World War II and into the ‘40s and ‘50s, but they were deployed rather slowly. I mean television took, you know, a decade or more to start penetrating households, etc., etc. You know, the iPhones – whoosh – 18 months, and millions and millions of people have iPhones, and all the apps, etc.

So we are in cusp – I don’t think we are yet at the point where we see precisely what model is going to the best. And my suspicion is, in some places you’re going to find local journalists coming together and hire an e-platform, replicating what used to be the traditional print media, and then doing more. Some places, they don’t have that center of mass, so the library might be the one that steps in to other places.

The one thing, the concern is that in the old media there was always a journalistic effort and a factual standard and a sort of principled approach to providing both sides of the story, different viewpoints, etc. Maybe not the editorial page, but the news pages. And one of the concerns I have is that it is now possible to sort of self-select your own, you know, media, so that you’re just reinforcing – you’re not learning, you’re just reinforcing what you thought, or what you didn’t think, but a gut reaction. And that’s, again, I think where the libraries can play a critical role, because a professional librarian, that standard of sort of intellectual honestly, that there are two sides at least (where I come from, there are many more than two sides) there are two sides to each story, that is so important. And I hate to see – that’s one of the reasons, you know, away from just the access to computers, and access this, but just the integrity, the intellectual integrity that librarians bring to the process is something we can’t lose. It’s not heralded enough. We can’t lose it.

PROV. COMM. LIBRARY WORKERS WILL BE PAID DURING UPCOMING CLOSING, BUT FOREGO PENSION BENEFITS FOR 1 YEAR

A WIDE REACH
The Providence Community Library's
Locations In Nine Neighborhoods

Libraries - and the Arab Spring

A hungry reader

REED: Libraries are "the future," and will play key roles as providers of Internet access, reliable facts and 'common ground.'

Libraries in the 21st Century: A conversation with Senator Jack Reed

Reed, Capitol Hill's leading advocate for libraries, says they may be playing a more important role today than in the past.

The LIBRARY LINE

Archives

Categories

PROV. COMM. LIBRARY WORKERS WILL BE PAID DURING UPCOMING CLOSING, BUT FOREGO PENSION BENEFITS FOR 1 YEAR

A WIDE REACHThe Providence Community Library'sLocations In Nine Neighborhoods

Libraries - and the Arab Spring

A hungry reader

REED: Libraries are "the future," and will play key roles as providers of Internet access, reliable facts and 'common ground.'

Libraries in the 21st Century: A conversation with Senator Jack Reed

Reed, Capitol Hill's leading advocate for libraries, says they may be playing a more important role today than in the past.

The LIBRARY LINE

Archives

Categories

A WIDE REACH
The Providence Community Library's
Locations In Nine Neighborhoods