Library patrons are already feeling the pinch after the 58 per cent budget cut to regional libraries. That amounts to $4.8 million dollars off the more than $14 billion dollar budget tabled by the SaskParty government in March.

The “One Card, One Library” inter-library loan system, which allowed library patrons province-wide to check out materials from any library in Saskatchewan, has been cut and now an online content streaming service will no longer be available as of next week.

“Unfortunately, we've just run out of funds and can not support our Hoopla service anymore which is our streaming movies, streaming music, e-book, comic and TV service,” said James Richards, regional branch manager for the Southeast Regional Library. “It was a strange comment made by the (finance) minster that he was promoting e-resource use on the one hand but then cutting the funding to the very body that does the coordination of that with the other hand.”

CUPE has also confirmed eight library staff in the Yorkton area were laid off this week, seven of them were union members, and union president Tom Graham says more lay offs are expected in the province due to the budget cuts.

Education Minister Don Morgan suggested libraries could find efficiencies by creating co-locations with schools. Richards said, at the very least, consultation and planning prior to the retroactive budget cut would have been required for that but it still isn't always a suitable solution.

James Richards
James Richards, regional branch manager for the Southeast Regional Library.

“Funding has been dramatically slashed and so we can't even get into the process of talking about finding efficiencies or further integration unless we get some restoration of our funding here,” said Richards and explained creating co-locations typically requires an upfront investment to ensure the proper infrastructure is in place and the province doesn't actually fund the library buildings. Municipalities are in charge of funding the “bricks and mortar” facilities as Richards explained. He said co-location libraries and schools do work in some instances but there are other issues with co-locations that also need to be addressed.

“Some of the other issues we've run into over the years of doing this is how do we balance the collections in terms of what is appropriate for an elementary school library and what is appropriate for a public library? We have DVDs on our shelves at the public library that are R-rated for example. Is that a material you want in an elementary school?” he asked. Richards added that the times of operation between a public school and library can be very different, especially in the summer, and that public libraries are open to everybody. He questioned what security and procedural measures would need to be implemented with all adults and elementary aged children sharing facilities.

“It's a tiny amount of money. It's completely immaterial. When you think about the $14.8 billion budget that was tabled two weeks ago, a $4.8 million savings is completely negligible,” said Richards. “It's not a good cost-benefit analysis here. For the small amount of money that the province puts into public libraries, it gets a tremendous service.”

Weyburn-Big Muddy constituents wanting to join the protest against the library funding cuts can participate in DEAR (Drop Everything And Read) Friday at noon outside MLA Dustin Duncan's office. Duncan was contacted for comment but has not responded.

The Weyburn Public Library is currently holding their annual spring book sale fundraiser. Funds raised from that booksale are used to purchase new materials for that branch only. None of that funding supports the regional library system or provides materials for it. For now, the Southeast Regional Library is maintaining inter-library transfers for the libraries under their direction but those materials are not available province-wide and materials from libraries outside of the southeast are not available to Weyburn area library goers. Similarly library patrons within the region are still welcome to visit and checkout materials from other libraries in the southeast region. Those services could still be cut in the future if there are not sufficient funds.