Comments on: Food and Stamps @ Your Library

By: I Like Books

I Like Books — Thu, 13 Sep 2012 22:16:54 +0000

Coming late, but anyway…

I wouldn’t want to roll all of those unrelated services into the library, or ask the library staff to take them on. They have their own work to do. (Give it to the fire department? Give it to City Hall? Make Wal-Mart responsible for it? No, it’s gotta be the library, they’re not doing anything important…)

But I do like the idea of co-locating different services. Like put the library into a community center that also houses a Post Office branch and other services that bring people into close enough proximity that they can window-shop and even walk in to see what the inside of a library looks like. A lot of people aren’t really sure what a library has; maybe they’ll find something they like.

By: mildred

mildred — Wed, 05 Sep 2012 16:33:33 +0000

Let’s face it, the main reason libraries want these services is to make themselves more useful to the community to argue at milage time. The same with all of this must speak spanish to get a job at the local AMERICAN library so we can keep spanish speaking people to not learn English. (I find this discriminatory as a) spanish is not required in this country 2) you are catering to one group of immigrants (what about Poles, Japanese, Germans, etc). I grew up in a bilingual area but our local library (while having a special sections for books in the language) did not make it a requirement to know that language to work there. If libraries cannot remain relevant for their designed purpose than they should be closed down.

By: spencer

spencer — Tue, 28 Aug 2012 23:23:21 +0000

Jack knows! Why not simply get rid of the library and open a full time charitable food service space run by volunteers- that happens to have a take a book leave a book program going on at the tables?

By: Rae Lovvorn

Rae Lovvorn — Tue, 28 Aug 2012 15:11:57 +0000

Hear, hear! I have spent today in my library doing mostly tech support for students trying to get papers in for the end of summer quarter. Shortly, I’ll be running a voter registration drive, and publishing the student newsletter. These are not traditional library things, but they serve my students, and help them think of the library as the place to go to get information. Also, they keep me employed.

By: Joneser

Joneser — Mon, 27 Aug 2012 23:17:17 +0000

Name the funder, or quit posting stuff like this.

By: Library Spinster

Library Spinster — Mon, 27 Aug 2012 18:57:30 +0000

In my library system, there are rules requiring that branches have to have a certain number of staff in the building to open (four staff members, of which at least one must be a librarian and another must be a security guard. Every day there are branches that open more than an hour late. Or cannot open at all.

It wouldn’t be good for the community to have their neighborhood branch offer lunches during the summer if they can’t be certain the branch will be open that day.

By: Mlisa

Mlisa — Mon, 27 Aug 2012 16:59:33 +0000

Except for Dan, most of the comments here have been interesting. However, the brickbat of “you want children to starve” is so tired. I’m sure we can have a reasonable discussion wherein we all grant each other the benefit of the doubt. My opinion is that teaching a man to fish is the mission of the library, but I’d be willing to consider reasonable opposing arguments, if they weren’t peppered with ridiculous insults.

By: Mlisa

Mlisa — Mon, 27 Aug 2012 16:54:45 +0000

Boring, off-topic and obtuse, Dan is a broken record.

By: Jack

Jack — Sat, 25 Aug 2012 17:20:01 +0000

“But as libraries become the places to get everything, they’ll also become places even less known for books and reading than they are now. Everyone can benefit, except for those people who really need libraries.”

Thank you, AL!

Some days I feel like I am forced to work at a homeless shelter/unemployment office/FedEX-Kinkos/Best Buy Geek Squad desk doing stuff that has zero to do with the library all because some executive libarian hiding in a posh office away from the public wants to look good at their next dinner party when they brag about all of the stuff libraries now do to “keep them in the forefront”.

The idea of adding a food kitchen or a post office would be the last straw for me.

By: Jack

Jack — Sat, 25 Aug 2012 17:08:47 +0000

“In major urban areas, where grinding poverty exists on a large scale, anything the library can do to help the individuals in the community, makes the community a better place.”

How about washing cars? Repairing clothes?

You can also start up a dry-cleaning service too while you are at it.
Yet another desperate do-gooder librarian that dumps even more non-library tasks on the lower staff while they feel good about themselves.

Because you can bet they aren’t going to dirty themselves with it.

How about quitting and going to work for a charity or the welfare office if you dont think a library that does actual library stuff is enough.