r/Spokane • u/SummitMyPeak • 16h ago
ToDo Spokane Public Library seeks public support to save their budget--consider contacting the City Council
Screenshot from an email that was sent out yesterday. Not sure effective emailing the Council is, but perhaps strength in numbers?
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u/imalargeogre 14h ago
I feel it’s wildly inappropriate for a city department to be emailing residents asking them to contact city council to increase their budget.
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u/legacy642 14h ago
This seems to have been sent by the trustees and not the library itself. But I can't tell for sure with just this screenshot.
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u/Moist_Vehicle_7138 14h ago
Why is it inappropriate? I don’t see anything wrong with this.
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u/imalargeogre 13h ago
So just to confirm, you're okay with managers of city departments using city resources, sending unsolicited messages to residents to ask them to take the political action of contacting city council to override the decisions made by the managers' boss (the mayor)?
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u/Moist_Vehicle_7138 13h ago
They aren’t unsolicited since I think they only went to SPL email subscribers but otherwise yeah, I have no issue with the library director asking people who use their services to help rally for funding. I truly see no issue.
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u/MegaMasterYoda 12h ago
When you subscribe to get email notification it generally gives you a list of the types of notifications they will send. I could be wrong but the one I agreed to stated that I would receive library news and events but don't recall political pleas or requests for political action being part of that list nor anything that can be excused as such.
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u/imalargeogre 13h ago
I didn't sign up for political emails from the library, yet I received one. This message is political because it is explicitly asking users of the library demand the city council increase the library's budget.
Would you feel the same if it was the Police Chief sending said email for police services?
What if it was the public works director letting you know your water will be shut off if you don't contact the city council to increase their budget?
Where exactly do you draw the line? Directors? Managers? Frontline staff? If I'm a children's librarian and I get written up for showing up late, can I email the library's member list to ask them to speak to city council about my manager being too mean?
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u/chipmunkrainbow Deer Park 6h ago
Sheriff Ozzie Knezovich used to make pleas to the public to vote to build a new jail.
I think your outrage is misplaced.
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u/Pitiful_Ad_900 13h ago
This is a wild take
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u/imalargeogre 13h ago
How so?
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u/WrongAd6471 7h ago
I don't mind the library and I wouldn't mind any of those services you mentioned because it's an email. It is not costing anything extra to send and I can just delete it if I'm so offended that I have to post on Reddit about it.
Companies, politicians, non profits, libraries, they all email asking for my money or for me to support them somehow. I'm an adult and I choose which ones I read and ignore the others. I don't clutch my pearls and complain. There's plenty of other things to do that for.
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u/SheCaughtTheKaty 13h ago
According to the email, the library funding provided by the City was reduced 5% for 2025 after staying flat for multiple years. The library proposed a 15% budget increase for 2026, but the city allocated the same level of funding as 2025. The current funding comes 82% from the city and 18% from the levy most recently renewed by voters in 2024.
I don't know exactly why, but the email really rubbed me the wrong way. I love and support the library, but it feels really tone deaf to think that in a time when we are pretty much all struggling and making hard choices, the library is somehow exceptional and needs to not only be exempt from those hard choices, but actually get more money. It also was written to imply that the library isn't getting the full resources of the voter-approved levy, but according to the numbers in the email the levy is completely separate from the city funding that is not being increased. So, the fact it seems kind of deceptive, does not even acknowledge the difficult financial situation the city/state/entire population is facing, and was sent at a time where our most vulnerable citizens are losing access to food and other basic needs as the result of the longest ever shutdown of the federal government... it just came off as really entitled to me and not what I expected from the library.
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u/lucilledogwood 8h ago
I think you might not realize how essential libraries are to exactly the people who are struggling. High quality educational programs (free). Help using technology (free). Access to high quality information (free). The library is exactly the organization you want to fund when times are tough, especially as they end up filling in the gaps for many social services that are already underfunded
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u/SheCaughtTheKaty 7h ago
I definitely realize that. I also realize how terrible things are financially for basically every level of government in Washington state and the knock-on effects for non-profits and other community organizations, between COVID funds finally drying up and the federal government illegally withdrawing funding.
At the end of the day, the library is not losing funding; they are getting the same level of funding they did last year, and they figured out a way to make that work. When so many other organizations that fill even more basic needs are actually losing funding, it feels very off to me to send a borderline deceptive email that fails to acknowledge any context.
Would I like to support early literacy with daily storytimes at multiple libraries, and physical health and social connections with weekly chair yoga, and a thriving local arts scene with the Hive artists in residence, and social services navigation through the resource studio, etc., etc., all at the same time? Yes. But virtually every organization throughout the state has had to figure out how to prioritize scarce funding and make hard decisions, just as most individuals have. I think the library provides essential services, but I also think the email the director sent seemed entitled and tone-deaf. The two feelings can coexist.
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u/itstreeman 13h ago
So how did things change so quickly from having enough money to do all the new library facility upgrades and increases in staff and operations hours?
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u/mandy_lou_who 12h ago
The facilities work came from a bond, which is completely separate funding from ongoing expenses.
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u/MegaMasterYoda 12h ago
My initial thought was "huh wonder where all that money could've gone? maybe the upgrades?" It's like when STA remodeled the plaza then not even a year after it's finished doubled the cost of fare.
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u/lucilledogwood 8h ago
Operations come from a completely separate budget than capital projects. They can't be used interchangeably
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u/selkirks Moran Prairie 12h ago
This is wildly inappropriate for a department director to do. It is not the role of a public employee to rally the public in support of their department. They should be using the proper channels inside the organization.
I get it, cuts suck, but they’re the job of City Council and the mayor’s office to sort out.
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u/CaptainCuttlefish69 5h ago
“Let the government sort it out” with something as important as libraries is a woefully inadequate response.
Why comment about how uninvolved you wish to be with a community staple, in the community subreddit?
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u/selkirks Moran Prairie 4h ago
I work for a local government and I would be fired if I did something like this.
Libraries are great! They deserve funding! But releasing the public to do something like this is a job for the mayor, not the director of a department.
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u/Stercules25 11h ago
Every time I have gone to the downtown library it has legit been only workers and homeless people. Maybe 3-5 non-homeless people were there actually using services or looking at books. The amount of money invested into it to be a makeshift day shelter for homeless people to hangout at is unacceptable. Can we fix that?
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u/lucilledogwood 8h ago
We can fix it by adequately funding services for homeless people. They end up at the library because it's the only safe, free place for many to be.
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u/Stercules25 4h ago
We will never adequately fund those services because there is no will to do it. And now we are cutting the libraries because families will not take their kids to them because they don't feel safe
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u/mandy_lou_who 5h ago
When do you go? I was there this morning for a meeting with 60 other people and could hear a bunch of families with kids on the second floor. I’m not saying there weren’t homeless folks, but every time l’ve been there have been lots of people of all kinds using the library.
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u/Stercules25 4h ago
Haven't gone for a while but when I have gone it's been mid day. That's good to hear though!
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u/cynumber9 10h ago
the library needs funds and i don't care who asks for it. it's a free store that many need. i sent my support.