June 19, 2002

Libraries enjoying increase in building, visitors

By Steve Friess
Special for USA TODAY

The American Library Association checked out of its annual convention in Atlanta on Wednesday, hushing critics who predicted the Internet would make libraries irrelevant.

The evidence: near-record levels of spending on library construction and surges in visitors amid the economic downturn.

More than $686 million was spent last year to build 80 new libraries and renovate 132 others, a 15% rise in spending over a decade ago.

That's the most since the $732 million spent in 1996, when the figure was skewed by the inclusion of $100 million spent on one renovation in New York City and $165 million spent in San Francisco on a new main branch.

Speakers at the conference celebrated this rise in library popularity. Library visits have been up 8.3% since March 2001, when the recession officially started, an ALA study showed, implying that the public turns to libraries to save money when times are rough.

"Some people ask why we even need libraries in this modern age, but I can tell you by the building going on around the United States that libraries are more popular than ever," said William W. Sannwald, who is in charge of library design for San Diego and lectures around the USA for the ALA on library construction.

Consider:

* Voters in 23 states passed referendums supporting libraries in 2001, including the approval of $46.4 million in Loudoun County, Va., and $40 million in Houston. Already this year, 60% of voters in Tigard, Ore., supported a May referendum to build a new $13 million library. New Mexico asks voters for $35 million for libraries later this year.

* In California, where voters approved $250 million for library construction in a 1999 vote, the state expects five times as many applicants for the money than it can accommodate.

* About 1.7 billion items were checked out of the USA's 122,000 libraries in 1999, the last year the figure is available, up 21% from 1990, the ALA says. Indeed, far from the Internet replacing libraries, the new medium has added to the attraction — and to the cost of construction.

ALA President John W. Berry says the public is showing up not just to use the library computers, but other new options in multimedia as well, including VHS tapes and CD-ROMs.

Renovation projects started outnumbering new libraries in 1994, when the Web took off, and the 132 renovations in 2001 was the second most ever in a year.

"We're now approaching 100 percent of libraries that have some sort of public Internet access," says Berry. "Just about every citizen has access to the Internet through us."

Indeed, visitors line up before opening time every day at libraries in Reno, Nev., associate director Mike Turner said. The region of 350,000 people is spending more than $12 million to build three branches and renovate one.

"Perhaps people are doing more online, but we're continuing to see double-digit increases in usage and visits in this system," Turner says.

"We're still a tremendous community resource."

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