Toronto library finds savings, misses council's target

Vickery Bowles says hiking library space rental fees and using more technology would save taxpayers $3.5 million.

TheStar.com
Sept. 28, 2016
By David Rider

Toronto’s bustling library system is the latest agency to say it can’t make city council’s directive to cut 2.6 per cent of its spending without hurting services to Torontonians.

At a meeting this week, chief librarian Vickery Bowles presented the library board with 2 per cent in proposed “efficiencies,” through increased revenue from space rentals plus lower spending, thanks to technological innovations including fine payments at self-checkout terminals.

The $3.529 million in savings includes eliminating 8.7 full-time staff positions. To hit the target approved by city council at the urging of Mayor John Tory, the library would have to cut a further $1.077 million.

Unavoidable costs for negotiated salary increases plus improved services - including expanded Sunday hours at some branches - boost the library’s 2017 operating budget request to $178.8 million, or 0.9 per cent over this year’s budget.

“If TPL is required to find equivalent savings to meet the (council-directed) target, the Library would then need to implement service reductions,” Bowles wrote in her report, adding she’ll continue hunting for efficiencies.

Toronto’s library system is one of the busiest in the world, with 32.5 million items borrowed in 2015 amid increasing demand for online services and use of computer terminals in the 100 branches. The budget has risen, for the past six years, at half the rate of inflation.

The request, approved by the board, goes to budget committee and eventually city council, which will have final say in February.

Maureen O’Reilly, president of the union representing Toronto library staff, said the system is underfunded, considering the city’s growing population and surging demand for library services.

Responding to city hall’s austerity push by relying on technology to replace library staff would be “disastrous” for customer service and satisfaction, she said.

Library staff levels have dropped 14 per cent since municipal amalgamation, to 1,732.2 full-time staff equivalents.

The library is not alone in failing to hit council’s cost-cutting target.

The budget committee of Toronto’s public health board voted this week refuse to meet the 2.6-per-cent directive, saying further cuts would mean a significant number of low-income students would no longer get healthy snacks at school.

Savings from actions that would not hurt service levels should be spent on other health programs that need a boost, rather than offered to council to constrain the overall city budget, the committee said.

Toronto Community Housing has said a 2.6-per-cent cut, on top of huge pressures on the city social housing agency, will force the city to close some aging units.

The TTC has said it could meet the target but faces an additional $172.6-million gap in its 2017 budget.