Karen Heller: Camden should find funds for libraries before prisons

The central branch of the Camden Free Public Library has a broken bathroom and water fountain. The second-floor ceiling is partially collapsed and the rug, severely stained. The lighting, especially on cloudy days, is abysmal.

The last new books arrived in March when the library ran out of funds and ceased paying utility bills. The 187,000-volume system has never been automated. Books are hand-stamped and checked out as they were 30 years ago. The sole van, to shuttle books and equipment to two smaller branches, has been busted for three years.

And yet, on a summer afternoon, this dilapidated institution is busy, vital, full.

Sixteen men engage in robust, near-athletic games of chess. The children's book department, decorated in Honeypot yellow and Tigger orange, hosts regular programs. In a city where many residents are without computers, the Federal Street branch's 19 terminals are in constant use, more than 2,200 visitors monthly looking for jobs and checking e-mail - and that's with the library closed on weekends. Librarians routinely assist residents with research projects, school papers, GED test prep, employment hunts.

The Federal Street library is one of the few free, safe, cool, conveniently situated sources of support, entertainment, and advancement in Camden.

The central branch is what libraries used to be in most towns, and what giant bookstores like Borders have become in the suburbs.

And in Camden, a small city with brutal big-city problems, there's nothing close to a Borders.

There's very little of anything.

"This," says librarian Wen Gu, "is an oasis in the desert."

And now the Federal Street library faces the very real threat of closing forever this fall.

Camden is one of the poorest places in America, where almost everyone is employed by the county, city, or state, or dependent on their support and services. The $28 million deficit is more than the city collects in annual tax revenue.

New Jersey, battling its own fiscal crisis, has drastically reduced aid to cities like Camden. In turn, the city was forced to slash funding everywhere, $14 million from police and $7.5 million from fire. The libraries were axed to the bone, a funding reduction of 70 percent.

Last week, Camden County's separate library system offered to manage the city's system while extending borrowing privileges to its residents at county locations.

But few Camden residents have cars. And it still appears likely that two of the three branches will close, including the largest, the heavily used Federal Street branch.

"No matter what we do, we're just going to run out of money," says interim library director Jerome Szpila. "If we don't get any more, we'll scale down to one location by the end of October."

Camden's Centreville library, open five years, is most likely to be rescued. Dana Redd announced a new Mayor's Friends of the Library Fund with all proceeds marked solely for Centreville.

But that branch, while in sterling shape, contains far fewer books than the central location and is much smaller. It's two miles from downtown, five miles from some neighborhoods, and accessible by only one bus route with limited evening service.

That's not true at Federal Street, close to multiple routes, PATCO, and vital government services. The library, as it so happens, is adjacent to the county courthouse and prison, which are in sore need of expansion.

In Camden, the criminal justice system is one of the few enterprises that's thriving.

"How come they have money for prisons, but they don't have money for libraries?" asks resident Karen Johnson. "The libraries are life."

The irony is lost on few: Close a free service assisting residents with learning, locating work, paying bills, and improving the quality of daily lives to make more room to combat crime.

The pattern is being played out across the state. On Saturday, Trenton closed four of its five libraries, laying off 14 employees, keeping open only its central branch. Newark's slated to shutter two branches, and close Mondays and Tuesdays for the remainder of the year, with Saturday service solely at the central location.

The tragedy is that these choices are occurring in the land of plenty. New Jersey's median household income is among the highest in the nation, second only to Maryland's, while it's hard to find places poorer than Camden. Though the state, like most of the country, wrestles with severe financial issues, its $29.4 billion annual budget is higher than that of Pennsylvania, and it serves a population two-thirds the size.

If there's money for prisons and courthouses, somebody - Gov. Christie or South Jersey political boss George Norcross - ought to be able to find $500,000 somewhere for the library. Otherwise you're investing in the past, not the future, not stability, safety, or growth.

True, the old Federal Street library is dim, decaying, a ruin: a mirror of its city. But the place is vital and necessary and, like so little else in Camden, lovingly used.