Reston Spring

Reston Spring
Reston Spring

Wednesday, August 14, 2013

Consultants Say F.C. Library Needs to Prepare for Doubling in Use by 2033, Falls Church News Press, August 7, 2013

Unfortunately, the library discussed in this article is in Falls Church, not Fairfax County.

 

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PRESENTING A PRELIMINARY report on their findings, consultants commissioned to project the future needs of Falls Church’s Mary Riley Styles Public Library spoke to a work session of the F.C. City Council Monday. Left to right: Richard Waters of Godfrey’s Associates, chief librarian Mary McMahon, David Moore of McMillan, Pazdan, Smith and library board member Brad Gernand. (Photo: News-Press)

Here's a short extract from the article quoting a Falls Church library consultant:
 “There is not one library anywhere in the world that is planning to go smaller in size,” stated consultant Richard Waters of Godfrey’s Associates. He said that certain things, like DVDs and CDs, will disappear because all that data will be downloadable off the Internet, but “books are permanent, they will be in use by us forever just as books now 400 years old still are.”
Apparently Mr. Waters hasn't wandered a few miles west to Fairfax, where the County Board of Supervisors has decided  libraries are NOT a "core responsibility" of the County (whose responsibility are they?), where books are being removed at up to a rate of 50,000 per month according to one official County library document we have, the budget is being slashed, the staff is being cut by about one-third, and positions and salaries are being downgraded to a clerical "customer service specialist" level.

All in the name of "better customer service," according to Library Director Sam Clay.  What?  I kid you not!  I can't make this stuff up.  Very Orwellian, very scary. 

Click here for the rest of the Falls Church library article. 

3 comments:

  1. There is an online petition to "Stop and re-evaluate proposed changes to Fairfax county libraries"
    http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/stop-and-re-evaluate-proposed-changes-to-fairfax/?utm_medium=email&utm_source=system&utm_campaign=Send%2Bto%2BFriend

    ReplyDelete
  2. Has the Reston Association taken an official position on this plan to cut services at Reston Regional Library? I have not seen any statement or comments from Board members. Will they attend the Sept. 11 Library Board of Trustees meeting to voice our concerns and represent the interests of Reston residents? Please let us know!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Not to our knowledge.

    You may want to send an e-mail to Cate Fulkerson (cate@reston.org), the acting Executive Director. I'm sure she will be able to answer your question.

    ReplyDelete

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