TINLEY PARK, Ill. (AP) — Overdue books are not unusual in the
library world. But Southland libraries also are having to deal with
long overdue payments from the state, similar to what other
state-funded agencies are experiencing.

Two of the state’s nine library systems — all funded solely by
state dollars — planned to suspend services at the end of May and a
third system will close down in August because of the lack of
funding. All others are facing drastic cutbacks in staff and
services.

The Metropolitan Library System, which includes most Southland
libraries, is in better financial shape than many. It hopes to get
by on its reserves until officials can figure out how to keep vital
services alive.

“We are in survival mode,” MLS executive director Alice
Calabrese said. “There is no financial relief in sight. There will
have to be some suspension of services.”

MLS received half of its promised $2.5 million in state revenue
and doesn’t expect any more money until fall, Calabrese said.
That’s the same budget it had 20 years ago when there were 18
systems.

These systems subsidize some of the most popular patron services
— the interlibrary loan deliveries and the 24-hour online catalog.
Library directors have been anxiously meeting to figure out their
future and how to salvage these services.

While everyone has been aware of the state’s money woes,
librarians were shell-shocked recently when the North Suburban and
Alliance Library Systems announced they were discontinuing services
as of Friday.

“Forty-five years of tradition comes to a screeching halt,”
Flossmoor librarian Megan Millen said.

“This is very critical. It’s ugly,” New Lenox Public Library
director JoAnn Potenziani said. Her library is part of the Prairie
Area Library System, which also includes the Homer Township,
Manhattan and Mokena libraries. That system is short $1 million of
its $2.2 million budget.

“Illinois was exemplary at one time, one of the best library
systems in the country,” Potenziani said. “It’s still in place,
it’s just been eviscerated. It’s got us running scared.”

System services that will end include continuing education and
consulting for library staff. There will be more mergers among
systems and possibly even libraries, as they all pare down to bare
essentials.

“It’s like we don’t have a safety net anymore,” Homewood Library
director Cindy Rauch said. “You would think the state would have a
back-up plan.”

Library systems were created by state law 45 years ago to
encourage cooperation among libraries, promote sharing of resources
and created grant programs to operate a network of library
systems.

In 2009, the MLS circulated 8 million items through its loan
program, with four trucks making deliveries five days a week. The
Prairie Area system moved 11.1 million items.

The ability to borrow and share books has made smaller libraries
capable of providing better quality and quantity and has “empowered
libraries of all sizes,” Oak Lawn Public Library director Jim Casey
said.

The Glenwood-Lynwood Public Library gets about 200 books per
day, while Tinley Park, with the fourth-largest circulation in the
MLS, borrows and sends more than 114,000 items a year.

“Those books are very important to me,” Glenwood-Lynwood
director Kathy Parker said. “We depend on other libraries sending
us more.”

The goal is to keep the delivery of loaned items and the online
catalog, but if these services can’t be subsidized by state
systems, it could mean scaling them back or having local libraries
pay more, which isn’t likely given their shoestring budgets.

“We can’t afford to replace all the system is doing. It will not
be the way it is now,” Crete Library director Jan Schulten said.
Most directors don’t want to charge for book requests, but there
may have to be limits on the volume of requests and the frequency
of delivery.

‘We have to step up to the plate’

“When the state falters in its obligations we have to step up to
the plate and work together. We don’t want the public to go
without,” Oak Lawn director Casey said.

Consolidating systems and services has to happen, with a
movement toward a single statewide library service organization and
single delivery system, state library director Anne Craig said
during a recent session of library directors.

They will search for alternate revenue sources, consolidate
administrative costs and services, but merging of library taxing
districts could be tricky, directors said. Decisions have to be
made soon, but such consolidation won’t happen overnight.

What’s the best solution?

“I would like to see the state fund agencies like it should,”
said Richard Wolff, of the Tinley Park Library.

“There have been miracles,” Casey said.