Trustees Vote to Build Second Large Library in Roswell
Posted January 30, 2008
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution has a few
details.
Designing Functional Public Libraries
Posted January 29, 2008
Efforts will soon begin intensifying to get onto this November's ballot a
local bond referendum aimed at obtaining financing for the construction of
some new public libraries and the refurbishing of several existing ones.
Even before the funding mechanism for this proposed capital campaign is
obtained, county and library officials will begin thinking about how they
will be selecting architects and other designers for these new and/or
improved libraries.
Library buildings are too activity-intensive to leave their design
completely to the professional experts, some of whom (to judge by their
buildings) don't often darken the doors of libraries, and who certainly
don't work in one every day. LibraryLand is replete with buildings
(and with building renovations) that are essentially expensive monuments to
the clueless fantasies of architects and designers, and relics of the egos
of the power-brokers those architects and designers smooze with.
On the other hand, given the right leadership, there's nothing to prevent a
library building/renovation project from becoming an opportunity to
orchestrate into existence some genuinely useful - as well as visually
exciting - public spaces.
It's not too soon for the local library-building Powers That Be to
decide that upcoming library improvement campaign will not be based on
the lust for obtaining design awards. More helpful to the users
of these potentially functional new and improved libraries would be
incorporating into the planning process - and into the instructions to
architects and interior designers - the hard-earned wisdom of people who
work in library buildings every day.
No doubt the archives of "Library Literature" contain plenty of useful
and information relevant to the blunder-avoiding design of functional
libraries - if only the planners and power-brokers would bother to exhume
and examine this information. Certainly the advice of librarians currently
working for AFPL should be solicited. All of this available - and, in many
cases, hard-won - experience should be carefully reviewed to make sure that
AFPL's new or improved buildings are suited to and supportive of the
activities that will be performed inside them once the contract-winning
architects and designers move on (with or without any design awards).
Earlier this month, Joe Schallen, a Phoenix-based member of the PUBLIB
electronic discussion group, recently compiled the library-design
suggestions of fourteen other PUBLIBers into
a single, compelling list. We hope that the aforementioned local
library-building/renovating Powers That Be will keep this document handy
when the time comes for them to make the best use of it.
Newspaper Publishes Op-Ed Critical of AFPL Policy
Posted January 4, 2007; updated January 7, 2008; updated January 14, 2008
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution today published a
guest editorial critical of a library system policy that prohibits
adults without children accompanying them to use the children's areas of
AFPL's libraries.
The editorial's writer had recently visited the Children's Department of
AFPL's Central Library to do some research for a book, and had been told
by a Central Library security guard that he could not complete the research
in the department because of the policy.
The writer believes the policy is wrong-headed and interferes with legitimate
uses of the library's children's areas by adult taxpayers. He acknowledges
that the policy tries to address child safety concerns, but that those
concerns could be handled better by prohibiting children from using
children's areas unless they are accompanied by a parent or caregiver.
We think this library user makes an interesting point - that the library's
current policy colludes with irresponsible parents in a way that disadvantages
and inconveniences adult library users.
Whether or not the trustees decide to revisit this particular policy,
we certainly hope library administrators handle this negative publicity as
an opportunity to explain and/or re-examine its policy options rather than
treating the op-ed as some sort of unwelcome, unjustified threat to
business-as-usual.
We also hope the AJC's statement at the end of the guest editorial -
that a spokesperson for the library blames a security guard for what
happened to this library patron - is incorrect. Like other library system policies, this one
was enacted by the library's trustees at some library administrator's
request. Library administrators would be wrong to try to blame an employee
for enforcing a library policy, however valid or imperfect or wrongheaded
that policy might be.
Instead of appearing to scapegoat someone for doing his/her job, library
administrators should find ways to explain the library's policies, to
revisit every library policy from time to time to see if it needs to be
revised, and to abandon policies that don't stand up to logic or fairness
or a bona-fide attempt to balance the competing or divergent interests of
different groups of library's users.
In any case, library administrators shouldn't pretend they don't have
policies they expect guards and staff to enforce, and then go looking for
excuses or scapegoats when a security guard or other library employee does
exactly that: tries to enforce an existing, duly-approved, and publicly-posted
policy.
Updates: On January 7th, the AJC
published the library director's
response to the guest editorial. On January 12th, the newspaper published
letters from four readers about the library's policy.
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