Tuesday, January 12, 2010

Director's Corner by Sandra Collins

Each day, on average more than 2000 items are borrowed from Northland that are used to meet the educational and entertainment needs of our users. These are difficult economic times and with a 38% cut in our books and materials budget there will be a corresponding drop in purchases for the collection in 2010. Every empty space on our shelves is a lost opportunity to enrich our customers’ lives by informing, entertaining and sharing knowledge with them.

You can help create a richer library experience for the children, teens and adult users of Northland through our Memorial and Honor Book program which fills shelves with new books (and other formats, if you desire). You can specify a subject, age level, format or leave the choice to Northland’s collection development staff. A special bookplate recognizing the honoree and the donor is placed in each item and we will notify the recipient or recipient’s family of the honor.

You can donate online at www.northlandfoundation.org, pick up a memorial/honor donation form during your next visit to Northland or mail your donation (checks should be made out to NPL Foundation) and memorial/honor information to Memorial/Honor Books, Northland Public Library, 300 Cumberland Rd., Pittsburgh, PA 15237 or call 412-366-8100 for additional information. Thank you for your generosity.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

My husband and I were surprised that you decided to cut the materials budget rather than eliminate a staff position or two. In today's world, the overhead costs of staff and benefits are where sophisticated companies are making cuts, not to the product or services they provide to their customers.

Sandra Collins said...

Actually, though we have not laid people off, Northland is operating without 6 members of the staff who left employment in 2009 and 2010 and we have not replaced due to a hiring freeze. In order to balance our budget we had a choice of reducing our materials budget or losing additional staff which would have meant reducing the number of hours Northland is open to the public. We elected to maintain our hours and work to replace funds to the materials budget through other means, such as fundraising and donations.

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