Governor Granholm, shame on you!  I knew you were planning on discontinuing the Michigan State Fair and eliminating a few state departments … but why would you signed Executive Order No. 2009-36 on July 13, 2009 and think the best thing for our state would be to abolish the Michigan Department of History, Arts and Libraries right now?  Even worse, you are cutting library funding by 25% across the state!  Seriously, I haven’t been this furious in two months.  Why not let the library debt accumulate and wait for President Obama’s stimulus money to cover the cost? 

These cuts will go into effect October 1, 2009 if approved.  Some of the changes to your local Michigan library could be:

• Reduced hours and services. 
• Michigan eLibrary.
• The statewide interlibrary loan system meLCat would shut down. 

I know some of you are thinking either so what or that this won’t effect me.  But let me tell you oh yes it will.  Already one of the two libraries I visit is closed on Sundays during the summer.  I bet we go down to libraries being closed by 6pm by the end of the year.  No more Sundays for most of the smaller ones, and probable short Saturday hours as well.  With our state in an economic crisis, people will continue to be forced to cut their entertainment and educational spending.  People will go to the library to check out books instead of buying them, check out dvds rather than buy them, or cancel their internetand just go to the library to surf the net.  With 25% cut from funding, do you honestly think libraries will be buying new books, new dvds, and keep expanding the internet terminals?  Many people do not have home computers or internet, so what will happen to them?  How will they find jobs, find the information they need for help?  I’m guessing some libraries will have to shut down their internet rooms completely and may not even be open forty hours a week.  Any parents out there ever try to do homework with a kid without the use of the web?  Way too hard.  How about a quiet place of refuge during the hot summer months?  No more special events, either.  All of the special services the libraries give to the physically handicapped and blind will now be passed on to the Michigan Commission for the Blind.  So, if you have a disability, you now have one less place to go to for help.    When I was diagnosed with a disease I never heard of, I went to my library and they found just two books in the state that talked about my conditions.  Both were medical textbooks borrowed from college university libraries.  Had I been diagnosed with this after October 1, I may not have gotten the information I desperately needed.  And, please realize that the library of Michigan will get passed to the Department of Education, a department already overburdened and underfunded.  By the way, Michigan ranks 48th out of 50th in per-capita funding for higher education, and our governor just proposed $164 million in cuts to K-12 spending.

To easily contact your lawmakers to protest, click here.

http://www.capwiz.com/ala/mi/home/

I understand our state is in crisis.  Based on current economic forecasts, the deficit is $1.6 billion.  But, why does anyone feel that it is ok to cut in the areas that educate and help train people when right now, that is what we need most?  I use my public library five days a week.  I was planning on applying to Wayne State to get a masters in Librarian Science.  Unemployment is horrendous right now, and as I type this, I’m sitting in a library filled with people searching for jobs or filing their unemployment claims online.  What will happen to all of the poor people who CAN’T AFFORD their own computers and internet, how will they find jobs?  If you are the type of person who thinks I don’t care about them then think this – the more people unable to go to libraries to file for unemployment and to search for jobs means a lessor availability for you at your local Michigan Works offices.  Because, most likely, someone from your home is already unemployed or will be on September 30th like I will be.  So don’t act like this won’t effect you.  You will be sitting there in the parking lot waiting in a god awful line wondering what the hell is taking so long. 

Wonder what the librarians have to say about all of this?  Well, for starters, The Michigan Library Association says that these cuts will give them just $7.5 million dollars in funding, less than half of what is statutorily required by law.  Read more here.

http://www.martinwaymire.com/MLAEO200936PositionStatement.pdf

Michigan pays more money to the prisons than it does to the schools.  Why is this?  Jail doesn’t prevent many people from doing the same crimes.  Many people can’t learn their lessons.  Why not start our children off the right way and show them that anything is possible if they have the drive and ambition.  Shoot, even a poor welfare kid like me got to college with zero help from anyone other than myself and my librarian who showed me many things over the years.  There are so many more programs and things we could cut from Michigan’s budget, like the fancy new traffic exit signs that were recently posted all over our highways.  Or the governors mansion at Mackinac Island.  Or take home vehicles for any employee in the entire state.  Just look at these cuts she has already proposed -$100 million in cuts in the Department of Human Services, including eliminating before and after school programs and the supplemental payment for Supplemental Security Income recipients; $106 million in cuts in the Department of Community Health, including reductions in the Office of Services to the Aging, elimination of the Office of Drug Control Policy and changes in prescription drug purchasing; and more than 1,500 state employee positions will be eliminated in 2009 -2010.  Just what will be the trickle down effect from all of these cuts? 

 

Anyone interested in protesting should definitely go to Lansing on September 10th.  If I was a school teacher, I’d take my entire class.  All you librarians better call in that day and attend!  I’d go myself if I didn’t need the money, as I have no vacation time left and just a few more weeks employment myself.  But I’m planning on writing Governor Granholm and my state legislators and suggest you do, too.  Mail letters, fax them, my god, even call their offices, or email, but remember email is easily ignored. 

Governor Jennifer M. Granholm – P.O. Box 30013, Lansing, MI 48909

Phone: (517) 373-3400
Phone: (517) 335-7858 - Constituent Services
Fax:(517) 335-6863

 

Detroit Office:
3022 W. Grand Blvd., Cadillac Pl., Ste. 14-150
Detroit, Michigan 48202
Phone: (313) 456-0010
Fax: (313) 456-0001

Washington Office:
444 N. Capitol St., NW, Ste. 411
Washington, District of Columbia 20001
Phone: (202) 624-5840
Fax: (202) 624-5841

Marquette Office:
1504 W. Washington St., Ste. B
Marquette, Michigan 49855
Phone: (906) 228-2850
Fax: (906) 228-8347

Please, will someone tweet this on Twitter and tweet it to Governor Granholm as well?  I feel it is so important to keep these services going and if you are a fan or a friend, please help me try to save our Michigan Libraries from going under. 

Find out more information about the rally on September 10th, click here.

http://milibrariesforthefuture.wordpress.com/take-action-now/rally-at-the-capitol/

Wise people once said …

Perhaps no place in any community is so totally democratic as the town library. The only entrance requirement is interest.
- Lady Bird Johnson

They are the books, the arts, the academes, That show, contain and nourish all the world.
- William Shakespeare, Love’s Labour’s Lost

The man who does not read good books has no advantage over the man who can’t read them.
- Mark Twain

A library of wisdom, then, is more precious than all wealth, and all things that are desirable cannot be compared to it.
- Richard de Bury

The only true equalisers in the world are books; the only treasure-house open to all comers is a library; the only wealth which will not decay is knowledge; the only jewel which you can carry beyond the grave is wisdom.
- J. A. Langford