‘Autonomous’ Library Board Still Reliant on City
Though the Evanston Public Library is legally autonomous, it will be financially reliant on the City of Evanston for the near future. Can the library board operate successfully with such contingencies and will it ever become wholly self reliant?
It has been almost a year since the Evanston Public Library Board of Trustees voted to become an autonomous governing body by adopting a library fund model, but only in the past few months has the board been forced to take up the new responsibilities that accompany their decision. For the first time ever, the board will have the ability to determine how much funding the library gets in the coming year by levying a tax as a percentage of the money the city receives from property taxes. While this seems like an ideal mechanism to alleviate recent financial concerns and even expand neighborhood services, the transition to the new funding model burdens the board with a new set of considerations, including defining its relationship with the …
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Lori Keenan
4:23 pm on Thursday, July 21, 2011
Wow, Jordan, excellent reporting on a truly complex issue! Here's a question, though, in terms of real dollars to taxpayers, what would a 9% increase in the Library's portion of the budget really mean? That part isn't clear. In other words, on a hypothetical $5,000 tax bill, aren't we talking about less than $20? Personally I'd rather have my money go for things like the Library than buying … more ›