Niagara Falls PL to close
From AL's news feed:
Niagara Falls Public Library Faces Imminent Closure
Although city funding ran out at the end of June, NFPL Executive Director Betty Babanoury told American Libraries that Mayor Vince Anello came up with enough to keep the library open through July. But if nothing is done to fund it for the rest of the year, 45 full- and part-time employees will lose their jobs and Niagara Falls will lose its library. To prepare for that possibility, the board appointed at the beginning of June a “closure coordinator,” former Canisius College Library Director George Telatnik, who confessed to Babanoury that this was “the worst possible job he'd ever been assigned.”...
Library officials have scheduled a meeting with councilors July 12 to go over the budget again. “Both the council and Mayor Anello would like the library to stay open,” Babanoury said. One contingency plan proposed by Council Chairman Charles Walker is to use $1.4 million of the income from the Seneca Niagara Casino for the main library, while the city budget could fund the LaSalle branch.
Babanoury emphasized that if the library closes, it would be permanently. “But that decision has to go before the citizens of Niagara Falls as a vote because the library is in the city charter,” she added. “And I haven't run across anyone in the past six months who wants the library to close. It's been around a long time, since 1895.”
Comments
Oy. Meiskeit mishegoss. I don't know how to spell anything in Yiddish, but for certain ocassions, it is the only language I can speak. Wailing. Rending cloth. Niagara Falls, NY is a poor, depressed place. Of course, it needs its library!
I always think the American side of the Falls is such an embarassment, compared to the Canadian side. But I stayed on the maple leaf side, last time I went.
Posted by: Lisle McKenty | July 10, 2005 10:28 AM
Erie County (where Niagara Fall is) is in dire straights financially. Many public libraries there are at risk. See http://www.buffalolib.org/libraries/advocacy.asp
for more information. (also http://www.buffalolib.org/aboutthelibrary/governance.asp)
Posted by: Jill Hurst-Wahl | July 11, 2005 06:59 AM
Check out this article on other potential closings in that region:
http://www.buffalonews.com/editorial/20050726/1012304.asp
Posted by: Jill Hurst-Wahl | July 26, 2005 12:47 PM