Should the Ragland Public Library stay in the county library system or break away and be an independent library?Mayor Gary Daffron said there had been questions raised about the possibility of staying in the county library system or what the merit is of not staying in the county system.
Daffron wanted to know if they would be better off to stay in the St. Clair County Library System or look at an option of going on their own?
Judy Douglas, director of the St. Clair County Library System, said state aid is appropriated at $1.12 per capita. Ragland’s population is 2,062, which equals $2,306 of state funding.
“The bottom line is we provide service that your librarian Patricia Poe simply does not have the time to do,” Douglas said. “I have a Master’s in library science so I have an idea how to do budgets and how to manage time. We all work together as a team with the St. Clair County Commission and the state legislature to provide adequate services at our libraries in the county system.”
Douglas named a few things the county system provided for the Ragland library such as inter-library loan on books, federal grants, whether it be for technology or books, library cards, supplies and important paperwork that has to be filled out.
When Daffron asked Douglas the benefit would be to become an independent library, Douglas said she could not think of any.
Hulen Bivins, assistant director of the Alabama Public Library Service, was at the council meeting and the issue at hand is one he has dealt with in St. Clair County since last October.
“To give you a little history, Pell City has been an independent library in this county for several years,” Bivins said. “During the course of the past year, both Odenville and Moody have made the decision to be an independent library. I have already appeared once before your county commission to explain the law — what they can do and what they cannot do. We absolutely do not care if your library is a member of a system or an independent library. We have no dog in that fight. What we care about is legal compliance of your library, how it operates, the way it operates and the continuation of that operation.”
Bivins handed the council Alabama Code 1190-1 that shows where the local municipality has control over the local library. It also shows that the county commission has control over the rural population of the county with regards to library service and how state money is distributed.
Bivins said it does not matter if a library is with a county system or independent, the library will be paid state aid based on the per capita ration after the budget passes in the legislature signed by the governor for the total population designated for your town. That money goes to the system’s headquarters.”
Daffron wanted to know if Pell City got a portion of the county dollars, to which Bivins said yes because of citizens of Riverside.
“That’s what the county commission has done for years,” Bivins said. “They’ve awarded the population of Riverside to Pell City.”
Bivins said there are about 40,000 individuals who reside in St. Clair County who are not in the corporate town limits of any of the towns that have a library.
“The county commission has full authority to award that $40,000 however they want to,” Bivins said.
If the library does go independent, Bivins said it would have to be done in the following manner.
“The library board has to make a decision then they present a resolution to the town council,” Bivins said. “The town council has to approve that resolution and then notice is given by the council to the county commission with the request for an award for a percentage of the rural population.”
Douglas said she and the county library board met with the county commission about Moody and Odenville libraries withdrawing from the system.
“Their (county commission) feelings is that they would like to divide the unincorporated areas into one-seventh since there are seven libraries in this county,” Douglas said. “That would mean that one-seventh of the unincorporated would go to Moody, one-seventh would go to Odenville, one-seventh would go to Pell City and with Ragland, Springville, Ashville and Steele all in the county system, then four-sevenths would come to us.”
Connie Ford, president of the Ragland Public Library Board, said she saw no merit in breaking away from the county library system.
“The benefits of us staying in are too great,” said Ford. “Judy Douglas is a valuable resource to us especially when it comes to writing grants.”
