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The State of the Troy Public Library - IMHO
I went to the Troy City Council meeting last night to see what the plan was for the library was.
It took a long time to get through the censure hearing, which turned into nothing, and all the public comments in which people either praised Howrylak for his good works or criticized him and TCU for working so hard to defeat our last-ditch citizens' effort to save our library.
I stayed for an extra hour because I wanted to see Item L-1 which was
Scheduling of a Special City Council Meeting – Purpose of Revising 2011/Future Budgets to Provide Funding for the Library – Referred by City Council Member Fleming
The wording for Councilman Fleming's potential resolution was
RESOLVED, That Troy City Council hereby SCHEDULES a Special Meeting on, in the Council Boardroom of Troy City Hall, 500 W. Big Beaver, Troy, MI 48084 for the purpose of revising the 2011 budget and future year's budgets with the goal of providing funding for the library.
I was very excited to hear this.
But no criticism here. Fleming's goal was to meet in 2 weeks to re-open the budget to see where they could cut to save the library. He was trying to show his sense of urgency.
That makes sense.
The library will start the process of shutting down in January.
We need a plan now.
But as the council chatter went on, it was clear Fleming's optimism was baseless. The city council won't have the details of next year's city revenues until January 17th, or so, so what's the point of seeing what fat they can shave off the budget when they don't know what the income will be. And Councilwoman Kerwin said repeatedly that the numbers coming in are looking even worse than expected. There's going to be even less money than when they voted to close the library in the first place.
There is no plan. There is no money.
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