IMPERILED

It's been a long time since I have contributed to the Reading Public Library's blog, principally due to the volume of other tasks that have piled up over the months, which kept me from making entries. I am making one today because the Reading Public Library as our patrons and staff have known it is about to be severely abrogated--perhaps permanently.

The recession (and I staunchly maintain we are in a national recession, despite whatever edicts come floating out of Washington and Wall Street that claim we are on the road to recovery) has ravaged economies across the board. Funding for public libraries from the national, state, county, and local level has been slashed. It's the same for many libraries across the nation, but Pennsylvania has particularly endangered the status quo of every public library due to the ineptitude of our lawmakers in Harrisburg and their futility in striking an adequate budget deal.

I use the word "imperiled"as this blog's entry because 1) it's not a term one hears at all and 2) it is foreboding enough to match the tone of what horrific circumstances are afoot.

The Reading Public Library staff met this morning and were informed by the Director and the President of the Library Board just what measures will be taken in the very near future to attempt safeguarding some reduced kind of future existence for our institution. We are already in a position where we are not procuring any new material--or at least with extremely limited exceptions, like blockbuster bestelling authors. Staff has been reduced--and before the end of the year, we will likely be cut to such bare bones that a multitude of our services will be terminated.

It's gloomy. It's depressing. It is, however, also reality.

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During World War II, the British War Office created and disseminated propaganda posters to try and raise the morale of the English people as they faced brutal invasion by the Nazis. One such poster stated the following:

KEEP CALM AND CARRY ON

A staff member from the Children's Department actually made copies of this sign and shared them; I think it's brilliant. I take this as my personal motto as the Reading Public Library staff endeavors to face a future fraught with uncertainty and dread. I believe most of us will be facing the unemployment line due to the budgetary nightmare our library is facing. And our public--who have needed us this year more than I've ever seen, with people arriving in droves to utilize internet stations for job searching, drafting resumes on our word processors, and checking out books, music CDs, and DVDs by the thousands--shall have to contend with a library hobbled by reduced circumstances. As for my colleagues and co-workers who are still here, we will stand shoulder to shoulder and try--bravely--to execute our duties until we are no longer able to be retained.

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UPDATE. An official press release to the Reading Eagle was made this afternoon (09/25/09) by the library's Director. The three branch libraries--Northeast, Northwest, and Southeast--as well as the City Bookmobile will be shut down by the end of the year.

And this is only the beginning...