Update: The bill failed to receive a hearing by last week's deadline and won't be considered.
Indiana lawmakers are pushing for a bill that would drastically change the way public libraries are funded.
Indiana Senate Bill 32, authored by Sens. Jim Tomes (R-Wadesville) and Gary Byrne (R-Byrneville), would prevent public libraries from individually receiving property tax funds. Instead, libraries would need to receive money from their county or city government after receiving approval, in the same way that police and fire departments do.
Monroe County Public Library Financial Director Gary Lettelleir said approximately 70 percent of the library’s income comes from property tax, which means these proposed changes could cut their income drastically. The remainder of their budget comes from sources like income tax, late book fees, copy machines and excise taxes.
Lettellier said the Monroe County Public Library’s revenue is based on a simple formula, with most of its funding coming from a property tax directly for the library and a lesser amount from part of the local income tax collection. The new law may make it harder for them to follow this formula and hence would make it more difficult for them to plan future budgets, said Lettellier.
“Currently our revenue is pretty much based on a formula,” he said. “That's what determines how much our property tax revenue raises. We're able to make long-term plans based on the fact that it's much easier to plan when we have this formula. The worrying thing is, we would no longer have that reliability.”
Also under the proposed law, libraries would be restricted to a set of core functions. That is, libraries would be prohibited from offering services not classified as “core functions” unless approved by their local government. The Monroe County Public Library offers a wide variety of services beyond the limits of the bill’s “core functions.” It offers storytimes, adult tutoring, blood pressure checks, and other social services, according to the library’s website.
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Tori Lawhorn, the director of communications and marketing for Monroe County Public Library, said these limitations could impact patrons who use the library’s services.
“Something that may not be a core function within the confines of the bill may be very impactful to a certain individual,” she said. “So someone who goes to our volunteers in tutoring adult learners' programs, English as a second language, something may impact their day-to-day, that is very impactful to them.”
Opponents of the bill argue that the legislation would also take autonomy away from libraries.
“It just restricts our ability to do some of the creative things that we do now that maybe libraries weren't doing 30 years ago, even 20 years ago,” Monroe County Public Library Director Grier Carson said. “ I think that our community understands that that's a big part of what they get out of MCPL. Collections and programs and access to facilities are indeed our core functions. But we do so much more than that, and our community knows it.”
