Economic recession hits libraries

The international economic crisis has affected all levels of government from the national down to the state and local level as well. The crisis has caused widespread cuts in state and local government budgets. Oftentimes library budgets are the first to receive such cuts. While the budget cuts pose an obvious problem for library administration, library managers have other issues related to the economic crisis to deal with. Libraries nationwide are reporting an increase in user populations, and as the layoffs and foreclosures continue that use will likely increase. Which begs the question: how do libraries continue to serve the needs of a growing user population with an ever-shrinking budget?

 The good news.

Generally librarians stress the point that public libraries should strive to meet the user needs of their populations. For most librarians an increase of library use is seen as a positive thing. The higher percentage of our public using the library usually means that the library is doing it’s job, and makes arguing for an increase in library funding and budgets more easily justifiable to local and state governments.

The recession has definitely caused an increase in library use. According to reporter Sandra Hughes “Nationwide more people applied for library cards last year than anytime since they started keeping records in 1990. Just as library funding is being drastically reduced” (2009). The reasons are multifarious but ultimately the library is valued as a resource because it offers free services at a time when they are desperately needed.

 The bad news.

While libraries are oftentimes thought of as recession proof, insofar as they oftentimes depend on money from taxpayers which somewhat removes them from the fluctuations of the “free market” economy. Recent economic crisis have already affected libraries budgets, and major cities like Philadelphia have gone so far as to threaten to close multiple branches within their library systems.  In Utah the results of the recession have been less severe, but many county and city governments have implemented hiring freezes, which means libraries will likely see an increase in use, but have less employees and funds to deal with that increase.

 Organization Theory offers solutions.

Organization theory offers library managers a wealth of perspectives from which to view the effects of economic recession on their own institutions, and offers insights on how to deal with those effects. Sociologist W. Richard Scott suggested two ways of doing this. Buffering is an attempt to shield an organization from outside environmental influences, such as a widespread economic meltdown, while boundary spanning “describes the activity of representing the organization or its interest to the environment” (Hatch, 65). An easy example of boundary spanning which most library managers have already experienced is the need for libraries to lobby for their institutions to local governments. In extreme cases like Philadelphia library managers worked within their communities to publicly protest the closures of multiple branches. The protests worked, but ultimately resulted in shorter hours to help offset the costs of keeping the branches open.

 

References

 Hatch, M. J. (2006). Organization theory: Modern, symbolic, and postmodern perspectives. 2nd Edition. New York: Oxford University Press.

Hughes, Sandra. (2009) In Recession, Libraries are Booming. CBS news. Retrieved online feb 17^th 2009 from. http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/02/02/eveningnews/main4770599.shtml