Balancing Books, Saving Services at Public Libraries

Frustrated by Orange County’s financially strapped library system, leaders in nearly a dozen cities are exploring ways to save their library branches by raising money through community groups or even forming their own system.

Officials said they fear that branch services and operating hours will continue to be reduced despite assurances from library administrators that the worst of a $10-million budget reduction since 1993 is over.

In 1993, the library system had a $27-million annual budget. This year, it is down to $17.4 million.

“It’s been a dramatic, rather steep fall,” Irvine Councilman Greg Smith said. “It’s hurt.”

Because of the cuts, some cities are threatening to pull out of the county’s 28-branch system and are looking for support from municipalities not under county control.

Costa Mesa officials last week sent letters to Irvine, Huntington Beach, Newport Beach and Santa Ana to see what council members there think about creating a joint library system. With the exception of Irvine, those cities currently operate their own systems.

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Costa Mesa Councilman Joe Erickson said if the idea draws interest from other city officials, they could look into forming a central library administration and computer system.

“Rather than being strapped to the county, we could work with other cities and create a meaner, leaner operation,” said Erickson, adding the budget outlook for the county system is too unstable.

“I’m just concerned” about more cutbacks, he said. “Something else will undoubtedly come up and we’ll be asked to do without a little more.”

Newport Beach Mayor Janice A. Debay said Costa Mesa’s joint-system idea may be worth reviewing, but she wanted to hear more about the plan before commenting further.

And Smith of Irvine called the idea “promising.” In the past, he said, Irvine has considered withdrawing from the county’s system. Property taxes collected in Irvine make up more than $2.7 million of the system’s entire budget--about $1.5 million more than Costa Mesa, the county’s second-highest donor.

“We’re putting in the lion’s share of the money here and we expect to see library services that are proportionate to that,” he said.

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To please larger donor cities like Irvine and Costa Mesa, county officials this year changed the way money is allocated to each branch.

County Librarian John M. Adams said the formula is based on the city’s population, how often the library is used and how much money the city’s taxpayers put in to the county system.

The formula was set up for 1997 to give cities a clearer picture of what to expect in terms of library services by using an allocation system that wouldn’t be perceived as “arbitrary,” Adams said.

The new allocation system gave the library branches in Irvine and Costa Mesa a seven-day-a-week operating schedule--one more day than the branches had last year.

But budget cuts have left other cities, such as Stanton and Garden Grove, unable to keep their libraries open more than three or four days a week. Still other branches have had to shave hours off each day.

“It’s a shame,” Stanton Councilman Harry Dotson said of the recent reduction to a three-day-a-week library branch in the that city. The branch has one of the county’s most extensive collections of children’s books in Spanish and a loyal senior citizen clientele, he said.

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But while Stanton officials and library boosters have been searching in vain for money to extend hours, other cities have been able to fight some cutbacks by pitching in money from their general fund or paying the rent and utilities costs of their library buildings. Usually the county pays the operating costs for the libraries.

The nonprofit Friends of the Los Alamitos Rossmoor Library, raised about $15,000 to keep that branch open five days a week through June.

Help from cities and local groups has helped the county deal with the financial problems, officials said.

“It’s been encouraging to see the cities trying to work with us,” said Adams, adding the latest round of cuts should be the last for county libraries. “Our revenue from now on will be determined by the local economy, which all signs say will improve over the next few years.”

Even so, some officials, like Irvine’s Smith, wonder if library services will ever recover from the hit Orange County has already taken.

“How are we going to begin to offer the new kinds of information, in future years, to a county that’s already starving for it?” he asked. “More people, new technology . . . and we’ve lost virtually 50% of our funding.”

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Library Budget Shuffle

Here’s how local branches of the county library system were affected in the latest round of budget changes:

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Brea*: -$42,876

Costa Mesa: 68,647

Cypress: -58,589

Dana Point: 358

Fountain Valley*: -49,495

Garden Grove*: 23,237

Irvine: 176,155

Laguna Beach*: -42,718

Laguna Niguel: 89,013

La Habra: -36,487

Lake Forest*: -19,199

La Palma*: 27,374

Los Alamitos: -72,781

San Clemente: 51,852

San Juan Capistrano: -125,740

Seal Beach: -87,852

Stanton: -89,620

Tustin: 2,367

Villa Park*: -3,445

Westminster: -29,643

* Contributed to county system to help pay for branch operations and services. Nonprofit Friends of the Los Alamitos-Rossmoor Library raised enough to keep the branch open five days per week through June.

Note: Laguna Hills does not have library branch within city limits, but residents contribute $185,054 in property taxes per to county library system.

Source: Orange County Public Library; Researched by BONNIE HAYES / For The Times