Wednesday, February 8, 2012

Governor's Budget Proposal Cuts Libraries, Again

If you have been wondering what is in Governor Corbett's 2012-13 PA budget proposal for public libraries, the wait is over. His proposal once again cuts funding to libraries in the commonwealth, this time by an additional 5%.

For FLCS, this means another $30,000+ chopped from our 2013 budget projection. If we had not gotten a massive cut of $250,000 per year 2 years ago, this would not be a major problem, but a cumulative loss of about 1/7 of our annual operating funds over a period of just 3 years is tragic. We have already cut and re-allocated funds and staff members to the point where many librarians our now doing 3 people's jobs.

While everyone knows money is tight everwhere, haven't we done our share of cutting already? Libraries are the only places where all people can better themselves in a bad economy. Please support the important work of libraries by advocating stable state funding to public libraries.

Thank you.