Back to the Library

My friend Manel claims that President Obama is closing municipal libraries. I presume he means Obama is indirectly closing libraries by bollixing the economy and forcing local governments to spend their monies in other ways because, as everyone knows, most local governments are suffering from a severe debt crisis and just can’t afford the services we’re all used to.

My experience with libraries is otherwise, however. I’m a cardholder at both the New York Public Library (NYPL) and the Brooklyn Public Library (BPL). Although both these enormous library systems threatened to cut back services in recent months, the community has stepped up and donated the millions of dollars necessary to keep the institutions open and operational with only slight adjustments. In the case of BPL, people gave $37 million to bridge the gap between what the local government budgeted and what the library system needed to maintain services. Since about three million people reside in the borough of Brooklyn, that means that residents gave an average of more than $12 each to the cause.

The Brooklyn system is an expansive one to be sure. There are sixty branches, in addition to the central library which is located at Grand Army Plaza adjacent to Prospect Park. That library is huge, with expansive rooms full of bookshelves as well as tables for reading, studying, or using computers. But the library doesn’t have a modern look or feel. It’s as if the technology of 2010 was piled on top of installations from the sixties. Shelves, tables, floors and ceilings are stained and pitted; bathrooms are old and unkempt; the formidable lobby is funky and unused; the revolving entrance doors seem like they’ve been spinning for a hundred years.

I’m lucky enough to live just a few blocks from the Cortelyou branch of the library. I pass by two or three times a week to pick up books or DVDs. I often reserve these materials on-line and they can be supplied from anywhere in the BPL system and then delivered to the Cortelyou branch. In this way I have access to almost all but the latest novels and films.

The only problem with this arrangement is that it requires that I interact with the Cortelyou branch staff. These people are singularly and notoriously rude. When you go to the counter for help, they act as if you aren’t there and continue to shuffle papers, arrange stock, or sip cold drinks from oversized containers. They greet only their friends and treat questions, even innocent ones from children, with the utmost disdain. If you address them in a friendly manner they’re apt to look at you as if you were from Mars. Every time I go to the Cortelyou branch I have to remind myself not to take things too seriously. But if I could, I would fire all of the workers there right this second. The money saved could be used to give the Central location a new paint job.