At the board of Directors Meeting of the Library System of Lancaster County on Wednesday, Lois Dostlik President of E4 Exchange, Inc. presented highlights from their draft of “Library System of Lancaster County Strategic Plan: 2011 – 2014.” According to board president Dr. Veronica Urdaneta, acceptance of the study will not be voted upon until their July meeting in order to provide time for reflection and discourse by the directors, the member libraries, and the public.
Among the most trenchant observations were:
“Many individuals are mistakenly overlaying their childhood perceptions of libraries on current libraries.”
“Community leaders, pubic officials and residents do not understand the county’s system of libraries find the funding extremely confusing; and don’t realize the services the libraries provide.”
“There are significant differences between how the county’s various municipalities view and fund libraries.”
“Technology is a priority for all the member libraries as their users are asking for it.”
Dolstalik hardly departed from the outline as projected onto a screen. However she did make two very significant comments in the way of ‘full disclosure’ at the outset:
1) This was not a zero based approach, which Dostalik implied she would have preferred. The Commissioners “charged” E4 to assume the presence of a Library System (as opposed to individual libraries) at the outset. No consideration was given to adopting a different arrangement for the libraries working together.
2) E4 Exchange, Inc. had no prior experience in the field of libraries. The Watchdog as a one time advisor to the Lancaster Public Library (Duke Street in Lancaster) had visited many cities and noted successful approaches, much different than the home grown approach here in Lancaster which has caused a general sense of dissatisfaction.
The Watchdog asks: Why didn’t the Commissioners permit a true zero base approach and engage a national firm who could have introduced ideas and approaches that have succeeded elsewhere? The first suggests that the deck of cards was carefully stacked before the research got underway and the second implies ‘Lancaster Exceptionalism’, the idea that we don’t need to look beyond our county lines.
A new and shorter “Mission Statement” was proposed: “Provide resources, services, and expertise in a collaborative manner to and with the member public libraries in order to effectively serve our communities.”
We encourage interested readers to review the linked presentation in its entirety. It will only take a few minutes. Given their lack of background in the field and the limitations imposed upon them, the Watchdog’s impression was the same as his more knowledgeable spouse (who is the former president and current treasure of the Lancaster Public Library): E4 did a commendable job. Two wags of the tail! But a growl for the County Commissioners.
