Library plan is hard to read

Now that the city has announced that no library will be shuttered through the end of the fiscal year on June 30, the question becomes: Just how many days per week will the branches be open?

The answer is: No one knows.

On Friday, Free Library Director Siobhan Reardon prepared a report for the library trustees recommending a plan to keep every branch open five days a week.

By Wednesday night, Nutter administration spokesman Doug Oliver said that the issue had not yet been decided and that libraries could be open as few as three days a week.

And yesterday, Reardon said in an interview that "nothing is more fluid than this library schedule."

Yesterday, Reardon said she might have to step away from the five-day model at least for now, because budget cuts had forced her to reduce the number of branch security guards and there might not be enough to maintain a five-day schedule.

"My big issue in these libraries is public and staff security," she said.

She acknowledged that earlier this week, she told Amy Dougherty, director of the Friends of the Free Library, an advocates group, that she was "looking at" the five-day model.

Now, she said, she has to "go back to the drawing board."

She could use a model that has the libraries open three weekdays and half-days on Saturday, she said. Or she could go with four or five days, she added.

What she knows, she said, is that she cannot continue with the "shaky six" model, as she calls it - all branches open six days a week.

Budget cuts make that model untenable, and too many branches are subject to emergency closures, she said. Reardon added that she might need until the end of February to determine what the libraries' schedule will be.

Reardon said she had eased off her stance that a library must have four staff people present to open. Branches can now open with three if it is known that a fourth person is on the way to work.

For years, libraries were permitted to open and operate with three people. Reardon recently changed that number to four, inspiring protests from library users and advocates who accused her of making it more difficult for libraries to remain open.

Asked for her reaction to Reardon's moving from a five-day proposal to the current state of flux, Dougherty said yesterday, "Given the draconian cuts the library has had to endure, the library administration is doing the best they can."

Speaking for the mayor yesterday, Oliver said, "All of this is certainly challenging, but our commitment is to find a solution as quickly as possible."

The Nutter administration planned to shutter 11 branches of the library to help plug a budget gap. A judge ordered the branches to remain open.

The city complied, though it has appealed the ruling and is awaiting further judgment. Regardless of the outcome of the appeals process, however, the city indicated that all 54 system libraries would remain open until the end of June.

At the Fishtown branch yesterday, patrons arrived for the 10 a.m. opening only to discover that the building would not open to the public until noon because of a staff meeting. The Fishtown site was one of the 11 sites the city had wanted to close.

Doris Morris, 76, said she remained optimistic about the future of the branch. Shuttering the Fishtown library would be a "real tragedy" for the community, she said.

"The children come here from Penn Treaty Junior High to do their homework," she said. "This is not a rich neighborhood. A lot of kids here don't have computers."

James Moses, 33, said he had hoped to use the library's Internet service to check intercity bus schedules.

"I use the computers here every day to check e-mail," said Moses, a concrete layer.

Moses said the city should slash other budget items before cutting funding to libraries and other services he termed essential.

"The Eagles still owe the city a pile of money, and the parks still get plenty of money. You tell me how either one of them is going to save my house if it's on fire.

"What will they do to save my house if it's burning and they've closed the Fire Department? Send a tree or a linebacker?" Moses said. "Yeah, right."