Jackson County (OR) Library Services to Remain Closed

-- School Library Journal, 5/16/2007

The 15 branches of the Jackson County Library Services in Oregon will remain shuttered, following voters’ rejection yesterday of a ballot initiative to cover the libraries’ $8.3 million annual operating budget.

The system shut its doors in April, throwing most of its 115 employees, including 17 librarians, out of work. Jackson County is believed to be the largest library closure on record “I thought the actual vote would be a nail-biter, and it wasn’t,” Interim County Library Services Director Ted Stark says of the vote, in which 58.3 percent of voters said “no” to a ballot question asking voters to approve an additional 66 cents-per-$1,000 of their appraised property value.

Many Oregon country libraries are in a fiscal jam because of their long-time reliance on a federal timber subsidy, which Congress has not renewed. The lack of a state sales tax only adds to the problem, forcing property owners to foot the bill for new county services.

Often the property owners say no: Not only did Jackson County’s initiative fail, but neighboring Josephine County, whose four libraries have sliced their hours, also rejected an initiative. Josephine officials announced that that county's libraries will close at the end of May.

For now, Stark says, he’s feeling let down, not knowing whether Jackson County’s branches—most of which have new or renovated children’s rooms—will ever open. “We’re going to remain closed and there’s nothing on the horizon,” he says.