[OPLINLIST] Zero balance

[Patricia Marsh]

As someone who has working in states other than Ohio, when budget cuts are discussed I keep thinking back to my days in other states.  I think in one library, we ran the place on $8 per capita.
So what did we do?  We re-used everything.  Before coming to Ohio I don't know that I ever saw a plastic bag purchased with the intention of giving it to patrons.  We used all those extras that people have around their house.  Paper was always printed on both sides, and scrap paper was the parts that are left over from companies that print things.  We got the ends of check runs from banks and what we could from local printing companies.  We made due with less.  There were no refreshments at programs unless it was a major, major event.  In more than 1 state summer reading prizes were donations.  One summer our kids got left over toys from a local general store and donated books.  Our teambuilding was potlucks, not catered meals.   We did a lot of our own maintenance.  I don't remember having dedicated maintenance in 2 libraries where I've worked.  In 1 we used the city workers and were put on a waiting list for them.  In the other I used the trustees from the county jail.  Our collections probably weren't as large or as cutting edge.  Our programming was probably pared down.  And one of the major differences was the lack of degreed librarians.  You had to be in a pretty big system to have reference librarians, in most places degreed librarians were at the department head level and above, and in some even the director wasn't degreed.

In general I'm not an advocate of cutting jobs or not encouraging library school.  But we got along fine in these places; there were great librarians and stellar paraprofessionals.  We all did what we could with what we had-most of us not knowing any different.  I strongly suspect that when we need to look at saving money we need to contact our out-of-state colleagues.

Patty Marsh

-----Original Message-----
From: Jennifer McKell [mailto:thompsje at oplin.org]
Sent: Wednesday, November 12, 2008 10:32 AM
To: OPLINLIST at oplin.org
Subject: [OPLINLIST] Zero balance

I've been following this with interest too.  After the last downturn in 2001, I thought we'd come up with every weird little way to save money, but we're still coming up with stuff.  We just added e-commerce so that people have more and easier ways of paying fines and fees.  We're selling reusable poly bags at cost now (like Wal-Mart and Krogers) with our name imprinted, and no longer give away plastic bags.  We have been providing headphones and wiping them down and re-using them, ever since we got the last Gates Foundation computer grant, but pretty soon we will start selling earbuds for a dollar and other than that people will have to bring their own headphones.  We will have to get vendors' licenses for all seven branches.

 To cut down on transportation costs, we float almost our entire collection among our seven branches (wherever the item gets checked in is its new home), do as much computer maintenance as possible remotely, have remote network controls on all of our HVAC in the seven branches, and consolidate most staff/committee meeting times to one morning of the week where we have to have people traveling to a central branch. We really need to start using a collection agency for overdues, but haven't quite gotten there yet.  This summer we will have to cut back quite a bit on performers for summer reading club-instead we are thinking of doing several low-cost outdoor movie nights at our various branches, and we think that might go over pretty well in our rural area.  Have fun on a nickel, like they used to do in the Depression.  Saving money is my new hobby-the librarian's equivalent of coupon-clipping. Also apply for a bunch of grants.

Jennifer Thompson McKell
Chillicothe and Ross County Public Library
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