Denver Schools Get Mile-High Book Budget

Staff -- School Library Journal, 9/1/1999

After years of scraping by on almost nothing, Denver school libraries will now get a million dollars a year just for books. The change comes thanks to a school tax hike approved in November, which libraries can start spending this school year.

Until now, the district's libraries have suffered under site-based management, in which individual schools decide how to spend their budget allocations. The result was that spending on library materials ranged anywhere from $45 per student to zero, says Jody Gehrig, Denver's educational resources manager.

To make sure schools spend their windfall wisely, Gehrig pushed for various new rules. For instance, the board of education for the first time is requiring all schools to have media centers and to staff them with librarians or library technicians. Gehrig also hired a collection development specialist in the central office. And because collections in some schools are so bad, the district will require that all libraries spend enough to have at least 10 books per student by the 2003-4 school year.