Jackson County commissioners are faced with a dilemma over the new Sylva library slated to open in May: either pony up more money for staff or the library will be forced to cut hours.

The new library is four times bigger than the current one, and as a result needs more staff. It needs another $170,000 to remain open the same 45 hours that it is now. That’s a 35 percent increase over the county’s current funding for the Sylva library of $500,000.

But Jackson County is facing budget shortfalls, not surpluses.

“We’ve been hit pretty hard,” Commissioner Doug Cody said. “We are taking the punches really well so far. We are trying to be creative.”

The new library will have three desks — a main check-out counter, a children’s desk and a reference desk — compared to just one at the current library. The new library also has a large computer lab.

The current Sylva library is so tiny that any of the workers behind the circulation desk can easily pop over to the computer area or the children’s section. They can be reshelving books one minute and fill in behind the counter the next.

But the new library is far more spread out. The computer lab has its own room for example. And the main adult book stacks are on a separate floor from the circulation desk.

As a result, the new library needs twice the staff: the equivalent of 15 positions compared to just seven now.

“If the funding is not increased the hours of operation will have to go down,” said Chuck Wooten, interim Jackson County manager. “I can imagine there would be a lot of pushback from the public to do that.”

More than half of county residents have library cards. The public anted up generously for the new library, a sign of its popular support, Wooten said. Friends of the Library raised $1.8 million in grants and local contributions to furnish the library.

The Smoky Mountain Brass Quintet even commissioned a fanfare to honor the library, specially written by a composer to be performed at the grand opening in June.

“I think it would be very disappointing to the people in this community to not have convenient access to their wonderful new library,” said Karen Wallace, the head of the Fontana Regional Library system. “If we don’t get an operating budget increase, they won’t have the access that the facility warrants.”

Wallace pointed to the $8 million price tag for the new library and restoration of the adjacent historic courthouse.

“It is a big investment to build that facility. To not to be able to use it to its potential would be really disappointing to people,” Wallace said.

Cody and Wooten met with Jackson librarians last week to go over the figures. Cody said commissioners will likely hold a work session on the issue to figure out what to do — one of many hard decisions as part of developing a budget for the coming fiscal year.

“I’m sure there will be some nervousness over the situation, but we just have to drop back and punt and see where we stand on this,” Cody said.

Ideally, the county could increase library hours from 45 a week to 60 a week, Wallace said. The North Carolina Public Library Director’s Association recommends that the main library in a county should be open a minimum of 60 hours.

But doing so would take another $125,000.

Wooten agrees that would be wonderful, but whether it is doable is another story.

“We are really opening our library at the worst possible time,” Wooten said.

Cody said he would like to see library hours increased as well, but probably not until the economy improves.

“I don’t see us initially getting to 60 hours. And conversely I don’t want to see them be open any less either,” Cody said. “If you only operate 30 hours, that is not giving people much opportunity to use the facility.”

Commissioner Mark Jones said the county will obviously have to give the library more money, but isn’t sure whether it will be the full $170,000. Jones wonders if there is any middle ground.

“Can we shave off a little time here and a little time there?” Jones asked. “These are tough times and we have to make tough choices.”

But Mary Otto Selzer, a volunteer with Friends of the Library, said the public wants longer hours, not shorter ones, pointing to the input gathered during focus groups held in conjunction with planning for the new library.

“One of the things we heard loud and clear from people was they would like to see the library expand its hours,” Selzer said. “We need to listen very carefully to our community to address the community’s needs. We hope the commissioners will find a way to at least maintain the 45 hours a week we are currently open.”

Selzer pointed to the current lack of evening hours. The library is never open past 6 p.m. It is only open six hours on Saturday and not at all on Sunday.

“For folks who work and working parents there is not a lot of opportunities to use the library,” Selzer said.

Library use across the country has increased during the recession. Those forced to cancel Internet service at home have turned to public computers at the library. More people are checking out movies instead of going to the video store, reading newspapers and magazines at the library instead of home subscriptions and borrowing books instead of buying them.

The library is also a place used by job seekers and those going back to school, he said.

Indeed, Wallace said the computer terminals are popular with those looking for work, since many jobs require people to fill out online applications. Wallace also said they’ve seen an increase in people who have turned to distance learning for new degrees, which require online exams.

Jones suggested enlisting volunteers. That plan has shown promise for the Green Energy Park, which attracted 45 prospective volunteers to an organizing meeting last week following news that the county would cut its funding. The Green Energy Park houses a collection of artist studios fueled by methane seeping out of decomposing trash at the old county landfill.

“Ask not what your county can do for you, but what you can do for your county,” Jones said.

Coming from behind

While another $170,000 annually is a substantial increase, Jackson librarians point out that the library is severely underfunded today. Part of the increase is merely catching up to where they should be already, according to Wallace.

When compared to surrounding counties, Jackson County libraries are indeed underfunded. Library funding amounts to $15 for each county resident. Per capita, that’s 36 percent below Haywood County and almost 50 percent below Macon County. Jackson’s library funding is 25 percent below the state average for all 100 counties.

Since the Sylva library is so small and antiquated, however, it isn’t used as much as libraries in other communities. Macon County sees nearly twice the library use of Jackson, for example.

Until now, that’s allowed the Sylva library to get by on fewer dollars.

Dottie Brunette, the head librarian in Jackson County, said she would have been hard-pressed to squeeze more staff into the existing library. There simply wasn’t enough elbow room for more people behind the small desk.

Jackson’s librarians are bracing for an explosion in library use when the new one opens, however.

Since a new library opened in Franklin in 2007, library use has shot up 50 percent. When Transylvania and Polk counties opened new libraries recently, they saw even bigger increases. The upsurge wasn’t a mere blip following the opening of a new library, but went up and stayed up permanently.

The stage is set in Sylva for an even more dramatic increase in library use than what was seen in other communities where new libraries opened. The current library is so bad, a smaller segment of the public uses it.

“The library has not been able to meet their needs. If you come to the library and can’t get what you need, after a while you just stop trying,” Wallace said.

Only 50 percent of Jackson residents hold library cards. In Macon County, that number was already 75 percent prior to the new library opening. Additional library use could only climb so high, and indeed most of the increased use in Macon came from existing cardholders simply visiting more often. But in Jackson County, the increase will not only come from more trips among existing users but from brand new users.

Wallace also pointed out that new library construction has been prominent in the public eye.

“I anticipate the numbers may be even higher in Jackson,” Wallace said. “I say that because the building of this library has had a very successful marketing campaign. And this library has been a long time coming.”

Jackson’s libraries are at the bottom of the barrel in yet another category. The volume of books and materials per capita are less than in Haywood, Macon or Swain. Again, there simply wasn’t room for stuff.

“There’s books lying across the tops of shelves because we have no room,” said Brunette.

Out of the blue?

In addition to the extra staffing, the county is on the hook for bigger heating and cooling bills, higher liability insurance and more janitors. County Manager Chuck Wooten estimates the cost of running the building will go up by $70,000 to $90,000, from $50,000 now.

Wooten, who came on board as interim county manager at the same time the new commissioners took office, said he does not know if these calculations were done previously.

“I could not find where there was an estimate of what it would be with the new building,” Wooten said.

An increase in library funding has blindsided three newly elected commissioners as they grapple with how to cut the county’s budget.

“Doesn’t seem amazing to you that this just came up? Why couldn’t this have been figured out when we thought about building the building?” asked Commission Chairman Jack Debnam. “If I got ready to build a building, I believe I would look at how much more it would take to staff and maintain it.”

Three conservative newcomers to the county board ousted their more liberal opponents in the November election, partly on the resounding Republican platform of reducing government spending.

But now this has landed in their laps, they said.

“This should have been anticipated two or three years ago when they started this project,” Cody said. “I am not trying to throw blame on anyone, but when you have a two-story building you effectively have to double your staff to keep people from carrying the place away.”

According to Tom Massie, a former commissioner who lost re-election last fall, the old board was well aware of costs the new library would require.

“We’re not stupid,” Massie said. “We knew it would cost more and we would have to rearrange funds. You do that in every budget year.”

Massie said deciding how to spend limited county money goes with the territory.

“We had our priorities and they have their priorities, and those are the tough decisions they will have to make,” Massie said.

Massie said the new board is learning that the job isn’t as easy as it looks.

“They had all the answers in the campaign,” Massie said.

Massie said the rubber will meet the road over the next few months as the new board develops a budget for the coming fiscal year.

“Come July 1, they are going to own the new budget,” Massie said.

Commissioner Mark Jones, who served on the old board with Massie and is still on there now, also said the increased costs aren’t exactly a surprise.

“We were aware that the new facility, with the size and the fact that it has multiple levels, would take additional staff,” Jones said.

Jones said when the last board embarked on the new library in 2007, they didn’t realize how much the recession would hurt county coffers.

When asked if the new library was a bad idea, neither Debnam nor Cody would go that far.

“I’m not going to go there,” Debnam said, when asked if the library shouldn’t have been built. But said “they should have considered it.”

“Regardless of how anyone feels about it, the library is there,” Cody said. “I have been through it and it is a beautiful facility. I am not going to tell you or anyone else I would have done anything any different. It is great.”

When Jackson County opens its new library, it will be with a little more than just the usual fanfare. Thanks to the efforts of the Smoky Mountain Brass Quintet, the occasion will also be marked by a performance of “Smoky Moutain Fanfare,” a new piece of music commissioned especially for the library’s christening.

The score was penned by composer and teacher David Sampson, a friend of the quartet and a sought-after composer from New Jersey.

Quintet member David Ginn said inspiration for the concept struck him as he was driving by the new facility in mid-construction; he realized that such a monumental and unique project needed something equally unique to commemorate its birth.

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“A project this special, it’s got to have it’s own fanfare,” Ginn recounted, and shortly thereafter, he took the idea to his four fellow members.

Trumpeter Brad Ulrich was scheduled to have dinner with Sampson around the same time, and after a mention of the idea and a little more discussion, the seed of an idea began to spring to life. The rest, said Sampson, is history.

Of his composition, he said he hit the books — and the Internet — for some Appalachian research before diving into the piece. He wanted, he said, for it to have the same unique mountain flavor that makes the Smoky Mountains so appealing and steeped in history and tradition.

Sampson listened to bluegrass, gospel hymns and the shape-note singing that found its genesis in the heart of Western North Carolina. He tried to translate that down-home, celebratory flavor into notes that brass instruments could understand.

“There is certainly a hint of North Carolina,” said Sampson. “Anytime you expand a place that’s designed for learning, it’s a time to celebrate.”

Although he relied on his research to guide him when crafting the tune, Sampson said the process itself was an exercise in spontaneity — once he started banging out the melody, the rest of the piece seemed to tumble out after it.

While he put his heart and soul into the music as its creator, Sampson said he left room — as he always does — for the performers to impose their own take on what he’s come up with.

For this particular fanfare, Sampson said he has such confidence in the talents of the players that he’s sure they can’t help but make it better.

“I know these musicians are very high level,” said Sampson. “When you’re dealing with a group that has a lot of experience, if they bring that to my music it’s going to make my music even richer.”

And he’s not remiss in his judgment of the quintet. All five members are seasoned performance musicians with university-level musical training; many members still actively teach the craft at nearby Western Carolina University.

They’ve traveled extensively, performing not only around the region but around the globe, in locales as diverse as Russia, the United Kingdom and China.

And while Ginn said they haven’t put the finishing touches on their performance of the fanfare just yet, they’re very excited about the one-of-a-kind opportunity to play such a piece. In fact, said Ginn, the June opening of the library may be the song’s first and only chance to come off the page, so they want to get it just right.

“It’s almost like a limited edition,” said Ginn. “I don’t know that this is something that will be performed again in the future.”

The library, Ginn said, is such a special project, built by the hard efforts of countless volunteers, that the quintet is excited to play its part in the excitement of finally seeing it come to fruition.

“There’s a lot of people that have volunteered and dedicated their time to making the library happen, so this piece is kind of dedicated to them also,” said Ginn.

Sampson, whose full resume includes commissions from such impressive outfits as the National Symphony Orchestra and the International Trumpet Guild, along with a plethora of grants and endowments, said he’ll be there for his piece’s inaugural performance when the library opens to – and with – great fanfare in June.

A way to support Jackson’s library

Watercolor drawings of the historic Jackson County Courthouse, painted by local artist Eva Scruggs using walnut stain, are now on sale as note cards. The depiction is modeled after a 1914 photo of the structure. Boxes are available at Used Book Store in Sylva, with proceeds going toward the new library complex attached to the historic building.

Good things come to those who wait.

It’s an adage Jackson County library users will need to bear in mind this spring during a month-long closure of the Sylva branch during the massive move into its brand-new, first-class digs.

Librarians face the daunting task of packing up 35,000 books in circulation at the current library and arranging them in their new home. It can’t be done while continuing to keep the doors of the library open, according to Betty Screven, public relations chair with Friends of the Jackson County Library.

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Volunteers with Friends of the Library are lining up to help with the operation. In fact, they’ve already started.

They have been combing the stacks of the Sylva library outfitting each book with a special radio-frequency identification tag. The new tags will take the place of the traditional barcodes used to check out books today.

Radio-frequency tags allow entire piles of books to be scanned at once, not only making it easier to check books in and out but also to keep track of collections. Librarians can inventory of a whole shelf in seconds without ever taking a book off. Library users will even be able to check out their own books.

The technology is considered cutting edge, but making the transition to the radio-frequency tags is too expensive and time consuming for most libraries to tackle.

The new library, which was constructed as an enormous wing on the back of the historic courthouse, will be more than three times bigger than the current one. The county is spending $8 million to build the library and restore the historic courthouse.

Jackson County Friends of the Library raised $1.8 million to furnish the library — from shelving to armchairs to desks — with $400,000 of that devoted to buying new books and materials. Newly purchased library items will come already equipped with the radio-frequency identification tags.

The new library will have a soft opening sometime in May with a grand opening planned for Saturday, June 11.

The completion date for Jackson County’s new library is just three months away, but the likelihood the project really will be finished then isn’t that great, construction Manager David Cates of Canton-based Brantley Construction acknowledged late last week.

Additional construction work, coupled with possible weather delays as this its-not-supposed-to-be-a-bad winter starts out with a battering of severe cold and snow, probably forebodes additional delay. A December target date was missed, too, because of poor weather conditions — 62 days of measurable rainfall in the first 90 building days — and complications with restoring the courthouse’s crowning point, the cupola.

The new library is being built as a 22,000-square-foot addition to the historic courthouse, which towers above Sylva on a small mountaintop. The courthouse itself will be devoted to providing community space to Jackson County residents, including an approximately 2,500-square-foot courtroom that will be available for almost any type of function or meeting. Office space for the county’s arts council and genealogical society will be provided in the old courthouse building.

The cupola is back atop the courthouse now, and a re-polished Lady Justice is shining brightly nearby. Inside, the library itself is taking shape. Friends of the Jackson County Main Library led a tour last week to showoff progress and detail the work taking place.

The future Jackson County Public Library is, in a word, gorgeous. Apart from a few libraries located at major universities (the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill comes to mind), it is doubtful any other community in the Southeast will boast of a facility as impressive as this one.

“I’m a little worried it is going to be so precious people will be uncomfortable,” said June Smith, president of the Jackson County Friends of the Main Library. “But I think and hope people will grow into it.”

Jackson County’s future library hasn’t been without controversy. Getting to this point took a decade of debate and a year of planning. There were arguments about the location, the cost and the need.

Budget disagreements concerning future library funding are likely to heat up again in the near future. Particularly since voters gave three of the project’s primary supporters — Democrats Brian McMahan, Tom Massie and William Shelton — the boot during last month’s election. Their replacements — officially-Independent-but-GOP-supported Chairman Jack Debnam and Republicans Charles Elders and Doug Cody — cited costs associated with the library project as prime examples of fiscal waste during their political campaigns.

A passion for libraries

“There are people in this community who are very passionate about libraries, and one of the most important roles the Friends’ plays is that of library advocate,” said Mary Otto Selzer, co-chair of the Friends of the Library committee, which raised more than $1.8 million since May 2008 in donations and grants to furnish and outfit the new facility.

To that end, Selzer and other Friends of the Library members join Jackson County Librarian Dottie Brunette in monitoring — and being visible at — the bi-monthly meetings of the county’s commissioners.

Setzer, who worked as an investment banker, said she hopes to help be able to educate the county’s new commissioners on the important role played by the library.

The three newcomers on the board join Democrats Mark Jones and Joe Cowan. They each have two years remaining on their four-year terms.

“They all are business people,” Setzer said optimistically, “and they like numbers and figures. That’s my background, too.”

In the three-county Fontana Regional Library System, made up of Jackson, Macon and Swain counties, Jackson County historically almost always ranks last in terms of per-capita funding. This even though the previous Democratic-controlled board of commissioners was considered supportive of its libraries, with one each in Sylva and Cashiers.

Swain County — thanks to a low-taxing ability because of the sheer amount of federal holdings within the county’s boundaries, a number approaching about 85 percent — has recently overtaken Jackson as the lowest-ranking funded county in the Fontana System, Setzer said. Swain County is just now beginning to consider whether to build a new library of its own.

Setzer said she believes the massive community response to fundraising for Jackson County’s new library speaks volumes about residents’ commitment for libraries in general. She said the Friends group would need to continue money-raising ventures even once it opens.

That ongoing commitment to fundraising does not, however, abrogate the county’s responsibility to pay for general operating needs, Setzer said, such as overall building maintenance and staffing.

45,000 items to move

Betty Screven, a volunteer with Friends of the Library, said great pains have been taken to retain the original feel of the historic courthouse, which dates to 1914.

Architects and interior designers used historic records to guide restoration efforts. The building, gutted during the 1970s, had almost no original features. So the team instead focused on the Madison County Courthouse, which Jackson County’s courthouse was modeled on when the county seat was moved from Webster to Sylva.

The old courthouse and the addition are connected by a glass atrium. This will serve as the main entrance into the complex.

Librarian Brunette said there would be about 45,000 items that must be moved from the current Sylva library — located near the base of the hill the new library and old county courthouse sit astride. How exactly to move the books, CDs and other library material haven’t been decided yet. Other county employees, with permission of commissioners, helped when the contents of Macon County’s library was moved a few years ago.

New items are being purchased for Jackson County’s new library, as well. But “we don’t want all the shelves full, you want to be able to grow,” Brunette said.

There are gaps in the library collection the librarian would like to see filled. The Cherokee collection is not what it should be, though Ben Bridgers, a Sylva lawyer, plans to donate many historical and scholarly Cherokee books to the library, she said. Brunette also wants more materials for young adults.

Bryson City’s Marianna Black Library could be getting a facelift, and library leaders are looking to patrons for a grasp on exactly how to do that.

In eight public input sessions held last week, Swain County Librarian Jeff Delfield and consultant Ron Dubberly quizzed locals about what they’d like to see change about the library. Delfield said the comments represented a broad spectrum of opinions about how best to change the library, if at all.

“There was a varied range,” said Delfield. “I mean, there was everything from ‘don’t change a thing please, I love this library exactly the way it is,’ to folks saying ‘We want outdoor staged seating.’”

The meetings were the first in a series of information gathering sessions for the library’s visioning process. The next stop for consultant Dubberly will be meetings with stakeholders who have a vested interest in the library — the business community, the school board and other local organizations.

Swain County is following in the footsteps of Jackson and Macon, who both held visioning processes before building new libraries. While no conclusions have yet been drawn for Marianna Black, Delfield believes that parking might be a part of the equation, if not an entirely new building.

“In general, folks that use the library a lot know that we need parking,” said Delfield.

He said that library users are also keen to see more of what they already get from the library.

“They’re asking for more of the services that we already offer – more books, more movies, more computers, more meeting spaces,” said Delfield.

That’s a sentiment echoed by library-goers themselves.

“I think they could probably expand the book collection, and maybe get more periodicals,” said Bryson City resident Dan Sikorra, who stops by the library to read periodicals such as the Wall Street Journal.

When asked what she would like to see in a revamped library, Nantahala Gorge resident Rose Ponton also said the library could benefit from swelling its stacks.

“It’s hard to find the books I’m looking for here,” she said, “but I think the Marianna Black Library is doing a great job.” Ponton mainly comes to use the wireless Internet, but said she’d take advantage of lending services as well if more books stocked the shelves.

Swain County is in the early stages of the process, and Delfield said part of the reason such a range of opinions was expressed at the forums was consultant Dubberly’s “pie-in-the-sky question,” asking residents what they would do for the library with an unlimited budget.

After gathering opinions from the community, the library board and other key library stakeholders — along with factual demographic information — Dubberly and his team will generate a report recommending steps to grow the library in the future.

More bestsellers? A computer lab? Meeting space?

This month, Swain County residents will be asked what it is they crave from their local Marianna Black Library. The surveys are part of an assessment funded by a planning grant from the State Library of North Carolina.

Jackson and Macon counties went through a similar visioning process — and in both cases it led to brand-new libraries.

At the top of librarian Jeff Delfield’s own list is simply more space. The Marianna Black Library is barely 8,000-square-feet when the state recommends about 20,000-square-feet for each county’s main library.

“I think we could at least double the space and not really be outrageous about it,” Delfield said.

Parking at the Bryson City library is so limited that would-be library patrons have to scour downtown for parking spots blocks away or simply come back another time.

Another deficiency is a section devoted solely to teens.

“Teens have nowhere to go in this library,” said Delfield.

Delfield points out that while Swain’s library is a fine one, it dates back four decades.

“Swain County has changed a lot in 40 years. We have, I think, doubled in population,” Delfield said. “Even if we could put another story on this building, that doesn’t solve our parking problem.”

Delfield admires neighboring Macon County’s spacious new library. It features a common area with a fireplace around which patrons gather with books and laptops. There are also plenty of small meeting rooms where students can get together to work on projects.

He said he can imagine something similar at the library in Bryson City for the future.

Another of Swain’s neighbors, Jackson County, is set to open a new 26,000-square-foot library of its own, far larger than its current 6,400-square-foot building.

Both Macon and Jackson county libraries utilized the help of Ron Dubberly, the consultant who will now tackle the library assessment in Swain.

Jackson County librarian Dottie Brunette said hiring Dubberly was helpful in coming up with a blueprint for the new library there. She estimated that about two-thirds of the plan for the library resulted from Duberly’s work.

“You have to know what your community wants before you can start doing those things,” Brunette said.

For instance, the Sylva community was adamant that the library’s location remain downtown, which eventully won out.

The process

Dubberly said most communities that go through the public assessment are eager to move forward with an expansion or a new building. Dubberly said the needs for space are obvious in Swain County, but the final say rests with the public.

“The first thing is you find out what the community’s needs are,” Dubberly said. “And you only know that truly by asking.”

Residents will be surveyed in early October to choose from a list of “service priorities” the library should provide. These priorities range from children’s story time to foreign language to genealogy materials.

Dubberly and library staff want to hear from people from Cherokee to the Nantahala Gorge and from Alarka to downtown Bryson City to come up with a library that will serve all.

“We want to reach people who don’t even come to the library,” Delfield said.

Dubberly will also meet with city and county officials, library board members, Friends of the Marianna Black Library and other stakeholders. He will analyze demographics and population projections before coming up with a draft plan for the library. Another public meeting will ensue before Dubberly presents the final plan to the library board and county commissioners.

The plan will address Swain’s needs for library services and also provide recommendations on space, furnishings, equipment, shelving, collection items and more.

Dubberly said even with all his experience, there’s no way to predict what Swain County residents will want from their public library.

“I just start fresh. I don’t have a cookie cutter,” Dubberly said. “Every community is unique.”

Want to weigh in?

Public input is needed to shape the future of the Swain County library, whether its an expanded children’s section, more DVD rentals or a brand-new library. Drop by one of the following sessions to share your ideas. For more information, call 828.488.3030.

Monday, October 11

• noon, Marianna Black Library

• 3 p.m. Qualla Public Library in Cherokee

• 5:30 p.m. Nantahala Village in the Gorge

Tuesday, October 12

• 10 a.m. Alarka Community Center

• 3 p.m.  Bryson City Presbyterian Church

• 5:30 p.m. Marianna Black Library

• 7 p.m. Marianna Black Library

Wednesday, October 13

• 10 a.m. Swain Senior Center

Kaleigh Davis, 12, comes to the Haywood County Public Library with her aunt Marlene Arrington almost every Thursday night. Arrington said the family can’t afford a computer at home so when Davis had to do a project that was a fifth grade requirement, the family depended on the library.

“There’s no way without the library that we could have done it,” Arrington said. “Thursday night is the only time I can come. I work during the day.”

Thursday is the only night of the week the library stays open past 6 p.m. But starting June 14, the Haywood County Public Library will terminate evening hours completely.

The four branches of the Haywood County Public Library system will see about a $60,600 cut in the county’s budget for the upcoming year, according to Julie Davis, Haywood County finance officer. That’s brings the libraries budget down more than 4 percent from last year’s $1.42 million.

This year’s library allotment is about $162,000 less than it was in the 2007-08 budget prior to the recession. “You’ve got to figure out how to keep the doors open and that’s what it comes down to,” County Library Director Robert Busko said. “It’s a big chunk of money to have to make up.”

To deal with the cuts, the Haywood libraries will restrict hours at some libraries, reduce the materials budget and cut one full-time position — the director of the Maggie Valley Branch who is retiring.

“It’s only one position, but it comes on the heels of last year when we lost two full-time and six part-time positions,” Busko said. That year, the county made budget cuts across all county departments in response to the recession.

Fines Creek Public Library will now be open Monday and Wednesday, and the Maggie Valley Public Library will be open on Tuesday and Thursday.

Both libraries were previously open Monday through Thursday.

No hours will be cut at the Canton Branch, which had to cut nine hours of service with last year’s budget cuts, said Nan Williamson, the director of the Canton Public Library.

“We are as skeleton as we can be in providing services to the public,” Williamson said.

Busko said part-time librarians helped cover schedule gaps created by the later night hours and staffers’ summer vacations, but after last year’s cuts, the library now only has one part-time staff member. The small crew makes it near impossible to cover shifts when employees take their vacation.

“My concern was getting into the summer season and getting in a position where we can’t cover the hours,” Busko said. “In my mind, we are going to reinstitute those (evening) hours in the fall.”

But given the lean staffing, a bad flu season or other unseen events could keep the library from having the staff to open the library on Thursday nights again in the fall, Busko said.

The evening hours are critical to some — whether its working parents with schoolchildren or those who simply can’t get away from their jobs during the day to check out a book or use the Internet.

But the library will keep its Saturday hours so those who are on the job during normal workweek hours will still have access.

Alan McRae from Canton is a computer consultant with a flexible schedule. The cuts in the Thursday hours won’t keep him from coming to the library. But McRae said he is concerned about the budget cuts to the libraries and fine arts in general.

“It’s a shame with our financial issues in the States that we have to cut back on all these things,” McRae said. “I hope we do come up with creative solutions to these problems.”

Busko said the library has examined the budget and cut where they could, but a lot of the budget is fixed. Certain line items such as utilities and the Internet can’t be cut, he said.

Last year, the Internet cost the library $10,000 more than anticipated, Busko said. In order to cover it, the library had to move money around from other areas in the budget.

“Right now, there’s no money to move around,” Busko said.

In case something like that happens again, Busko has cut excess money from the new materials budget to save up a reserve.

The total cut to new materials budget is $25,000, which affects the number of copies of new releases that the library can buy.

“Basically we will be working with a book budget that’s been the lowest it’s been in 15 years,” Williamson said, adding that book prices are also much higher than they used to be.

In the past, the library could buy nine or 10 copies of a popular new release. Now they can only afford five or six copies, Busko said. To make sure everyone still gets a chance to read the books, some of the most popular authors and books will have shorter circulation times.

“It inconveniences the reader because they don’t have three weeks to read it, but it insures that everyone gets a fair shot at the materials,” Busko said.

The libraries in Jackson, Swain and Macon counties are a part of the Fontana Regional Library system and have been mostly unscathed by budget cuts.

For the past three years, Macon and Swain counties have not changed library funding.

“We are so fortunate and blessed that the counties don’t cut us at all,” business manager Deb Lawley said. “But our expenses are getting higher and higher, and it’s getting harder to make ends meet.”

Due to a new library in Sylva, scheduled to open in early spring 2011, Jackson County has actually increased library funding by $121,000 to cover the new library’s operation costs for the last four months of the next fiscal year.

The tri-county regional library network receives about 20 percent of its funding from the state, Lawley said. State funds have decreased between five and 10 percent the last two years, Lawley said. Whether the state will again cut the network’s budget for 2010-11 fiscal year remains unknown.

On May 25 the Friends of the Jackson County Main Library marked the completion of their astonishing two-year fundraising drive, reaching their goal of $1.6 million to outfit the interior of the new library on Courthouse Hill in Sylva.

Jane Smith, president of the Friends group, put into perspective the effort to raise the money in the worst economy in recent memory.

“It is so amazing, because there were people at the beginning who said, ‘You can’t do this. Not around here,’” Smith said.

Kathy Proctor, chair of the Fontana Regional Library Board, accepted a $200,000 grant from the USDA’s Rural Library Fund on behalf of the Friends. The grant, which required a $1.2 million local match, pushed the fundraising drive past its $1.6 million target to a grand total of $1.726 million so far.

The Friends have raised $1.2 million for furniture, fixtures and equipment at the library and the $200,000 will be added to that total. In addition, the Friends raised $225,985 for the library’s collection and another $100,000 to offset costs association with the campaign.

The USDA grant came as the result of cooperation between the Fontana Regional Library and the federal representatives of Western North Carolina, including Rep. Heath Shuler, D-Waynesville, and Sen. Kay Hagan, D-N.C.

Freddie Harrill, Hagan’s representative at the event, praised the local fundraising committee for meeting its goals.

“Projects like these are economic drivers for small towns,” Harrill said.

Bill Hobbs, community programs director for USDA Rural Development, said he was happy to deliver the $200,000 check.

“We are tickled to death to bring this check to y’all,” Hobbs said. “We can’t wait to come back when the project is complete.”

Mary Otto Selzer, chair of the Friends’ fundraising committee, said the group would continue to raise money for collection materials at the new library.

“Not too long ago, we realized $100,000 doesn’t go very far for a collection so there are still steps to climb,” Selzer said.

Selzer took time to thank the volunteers at the Friends of Jackson Library Bookstore in Sylva, who contributed $155,000 and countless hours to the campaign.

“That’s the little engine that keeps the library offering great services,” Selzer said.

The Jackson County Public Library Complex is a $7 million building project that includes the construction of a 20,000-square-foot library and the renovation of the historic Jackson County Courthouse, which will be used as a community resource facility and cultural center for the county.

The Jackson County Courthouse, Sylva’s most distinctive building, was built in a rush.

C.J. Harris, a prominent industrialist and wealthy Sylva businessman, bankrolled the $50,000 project in 1914 in return for the county seat being moved from Webster to Sylva. Harris had it modeled after the Madison County Courthouse and got it built in a year.

Transforming the historic building into a community space and anchor for a new county library has taken considerably longer. After a decade of debate, a year of planning and another year of building, the Friends of the Jackson County Main Library hosted a tour of the construction site last week to showcase the progress.

“We’re combining something that’s very historic with something that’s brand new,” said Betty Screven, a volunteer with Friends of the Library. “While it’s going to be modern in its technique, it will be historic in feel.”

Construction Manager David Cates of Canton-based Brantley Construction said the project will likely miss its December target for an opening date as a result of poor weather and complications with restoring the courthouse cupola.

“Our first 90 days of the project, we had 62 days of measurable rainfall,” Cates said. “We’ve worked around our elbow to get to our foot to get construction completed.”

Cates said the project will finish in the early part of 2011, but the tour showed that all the elements of what will be a regional showpiece are in place.

“This isn’t just going to be great for the people of Jackson County. It’s going to be great for Western North Carolina,” Screven said.

Architect Donnie Moore and interior designer Lynne Wilson of Macmillan, Pazdan & Smith have pored over historic records to revive the feel of the Jackson County Courthouse in its original state. The building was gutted during a renovation in the ‘70s and almost no original features remain. Love and Wilson used the Madison County Courthouse, which has kept its original character, as their model.

The new complex will feature three separate architectural spaces unified by recurring design elements. The old courthouse will be converted into a community space that will house the county’s historical and genealogical societies, the arts’ council, and catering kitchen. The historic courtroom itself will be renovated as an auditorium complete with vintage theater seats that will double as a community meeting room.

A giant addition will be built to the rear to house the new library. A glass atrium will connect the two and serve as the entrance to the complex. The atrium is to carry the name of the State Employees Credit Union Foundation in gratitude for their $250,000 grant.

The two-story rectangular library addition will be open to the ceiling in the center, showing off stunning stained glass skylights.

To offer some sense of the upgrade the new building represents, its children’s section will be larger than the entire current library. While the current library is drab-colored and lit by fluorescent light, the teen reading area on the second floor of the new library will feature a funky purple and orange design scheme, coffee shop booths, and a view of the Plott Balsams.

Jackson County Librarian Dottie Brunette, was inspired to become a librarian by her mother, Ada Moody Brunette, and by long-time county librarian Sadie Luck. Brunette said touring the construction site left her awe-struck.

“My mother, who’s the reason I’m a librarian, is hugging herself somewhere,” Brunette said.

Fundraising nears home stretch

The Friends of the Library is 90 percent of the way to its fundraising goal of $1.6 million to furnish and outfit the library.

As of last week, donations and pledges totaled over $1,440,535.

“It’s been a very grassroots effort, and the community has responded,” said Mary Otto Selzer, co-chair of the committee that led the effort.

Donations to the capital campaign fund may be made at the Jackson County Public Library in downtown Sylva, Friends of the Library Bookstore at 536 West Main Street, through the Friends website fojcml.org, or mailed to Friends of the Jackson County Main Library, P. O. Box 825, Sylva, 28779-0825.

Last week a confused set of Jackson County commissioners learned their new library may cost more money than they thought, but County Manager Ken Westmoreland said the administrative mix-up won’t result in a higher price tag than the one originally agreed upon.

“I think I’ve got the situation unraveled now,” Westmoreland said Monday.

When the scope of work for the library changed midway through the project, McMillan Pazdan Smith Architecture wanted a higher fee. While the firm failed to secure a signed contract from the county, commissioners did grant verbal approval, but forgot they had done so.

The library was originally planned as a brand new building located near Jackson Plaza, but community advocates later convinced the county to build the library adjacent to the historic courthouse downtown, and renovate the historic courthouse in the process.

According to Westmoreland, the original contract between McMillan Smith and the county awarded the architects 7.5 percent of the total project cost. But in October 2007, after the project was shifted to the courthouse hill, the architects asked for 8 percent. Renovations generally involve more work for architects and demand a higher fee by percentage. Architects also faced new site constraints and the challenge of blending a new building with the old one.

The county board voted to adopt the new billing rate, and the project went forward. But the architects never submitted a new written contract for the county to sign. As a result, the county’s finance department never got confirmation of the new rate.

County Finance Director Darlene Fox continued to pay at the contractually agreed upon rate of 7.5 percent. When the architecture firm completed a merger with another company, its accountants notified Westmoreland of the error last October.

“I think when they merged their books, that may have been when they discovered they were paying the different rate,” Westmoreland said.

At last week’s commissioner meeting, Westmoreland knew of the error, but he couldn’t explain why the county never got the updated contract.

Commissioner Tom Massie said that if the error wasn’t the county’s, the county should discuss the possibility of “splitting the difference” with the architecture firm. The board directed Westmoreland to get to the bottom of the confusion.

That’s when Westmoreland uncovered records from an old meeting when the board voted to approve the new rate. Westmoreland said the county was bound to honor the agreement and pay the correct rate for work on the project.

“I didn’t have a contract saying 8 percent and finance didn’t have a contract for 8 percent, but the bottom line is the board approved 8 percent and that’s what we obligated ourselves to,” Westmoreland said.

Westmoreland said the board will not have to vote again on the contract, and the county will pay McMillan Pazdan Smith at 8 percent for the work. According to the finance department, the project’s total price tag is $6,667,169 and the half percent adjustment on the fee will amount to $30,335.85.