Part-Time Policy Wonk

From Hernando Today:
With the county facing a projected $10 million in lost revenue next year, any and all ideas to produce money are on the table.
Including privatizing the county’s library system.
County Administrator David Hamilton said that particular option will go before the members of the budget and finance committee when it meets April 7.
Hamilton said [...]

From SLA’s Public Policy blog:
SLA sent a letter to Governor Edward G. Rendell on 17 March 2009 expressing strong concern over the proposed 50% budget cut for the State Library of Pennsylvania.
The letter acknowledges the recession and the need for tough decisions, but opposes the downsizing or diminution of library services at the State Library [...]

From the Associated Press:
Hoping to tamp down a public outcry, Mayor Michael Nutter unveiled a $3.8 billion budget proposal Thursday that relies on property and sales tax increases to preserve libraries once slated for closure, protect health centers and maintain core city services.

From The Philadelphia Inquirer:
Apparently, doomsday has not arrived at the historic Pennsylvania State Library.
In his February budget address, Gov. Rendell proposed chopping library funding in half, from $4.84 million to $2.39 million, a steep cut in a lean budget laden with across-the-board reductions.
But yesterday, Rendell said a figure published in his budget proposal that projected [...]

From the Arizona Republic:
Less than two weeks after its dedication, the new state archives building closes today, the latest consequence of the state’s budget struggles.
The $38 million building, named after longtime lawmaker Polly Rosenbaum, opened late last fall and was dedicated in mid-January.
But on Tuesday, agency Director GladysAnn Wells announced the closure. It was the [...]

From American Libraries:
The $787-billion American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (PDF file) signed by President Obama February 17 includes several economic-stimulus provisions that could directly benefit libraries, notes the American Library Association’s Washington Office.

From the Association of Research Libraries:
Association of Research Libraries (ARL) Executive Director Charles B. Lowry recently published an opinion piece in the Chronicle of Higher Education urging President Obama and Congress to finance a large-scale project to digitize the nation’s library and other cultural collections and put them on the Web.
Lowry states that “Investing in [...]

From PennLive:
The State Library could lose nearly all of its staff under Gov. Ed Rendell’s proposed budget for 2009-10, and the proposed cuts are startling researchers who rely on the library.
Fifty of the library’s 57 positions would be eliminated, with one person transferred elsewhere in the state Department of Education, which oversees the library.
That would [...]

ALA Press Release:
Forty-one percent of states report declining state funding for U.S. public libraries in fiscal year 2009, according to a survey of the Chief Officers of State Library Agencies (COSLA) conducted by the American Library Association (ALA). Twenty percent of these states anticipate an additional reduction in the current fiscal year.
For additional information, please [...]

From the Philadelphia Inquirer:
A Philadelphia judge yesterday blocked Mayor Nutter’s plan to close 11 libraries starting at 5 p.m. today, frustrating the mayor’s emergency budget-cutting plan, raising cheers from library users, and potentially tipping the balance of power in city government.
Common Pleas Court Judge Idee C. Fox ruled that Nutter needed City Council’s approval to [...]