Staff Blog
Signs of things to come: Libraries announce October closures
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Friday morning, signs went up on every entrance to every library in the city's system, from Central on down, reading thusly: All Free Library of Philadelphia Branch, Regional and Central Libraries will be Closed Effective Close of Business October 2, 2009.
Upon seeing such, I rang Andy Kahan, the Director of Author Events at Vine St.'s Free Library of Philadelphia and asked what this meant at first glance.
First is that all libraries are now in a diminishing borrowing period and that all materials will be due on October 1. As for events and readings, Kahan says, though signals are mixed, he and his staff are preparing for the worst.
"Author events would be the only program that continues and I'm in the process of negotiating with other nearby venues — just in case," says Kahan. "Parkway institutions such as Friends Select School and Moore College of Art have stepped forward and offered their auditoria to meet our need. I'm trying to figure out which authors to place where based on the size of the audience and the institutions interest and projection capacity. I'm looking to nearby institutions because, in the event we can't reach all attendees with news of the venue changes, people who just show up will know from our illuminated signs which parkway venue is hosting our event — and they won't be late to the party."
One Book, One Philadelphia programming doesn't begin until January 2010 so it's still a bit early for the Free Library's event heads to look elsewhere — but they are prepared to take events elsewhere if necessary. Kahan is, like a lot of us, hopeful that Pennsylvania representatives will heed Mayor Nutter's warnings. "On one hand the House seems willing to pass the 1% tax and pension deferments, which would allow the city to continue functioning; the Senate is not," claims Kahan. "We're optimistic they'll work through their differences before the October 1 deadline."
Kiss a librarian today. It may be one of your last chances for a while.
[...] Citypaper has more. Maybe they’re meant as warnings of what’s to come if Mayor Nutter’s taxes [...]