To the Editor:
I would like to respond to the Library Lines column on page 5 of the Tuesday June 17, 2008 edition of The Wayne Independent.
When Molly Rodgers speaks of library user fees being prohibited by state code it made me wonder what it would take to change the state code to allow for user fees. Write into the new code a provision that allows for the user fee and a modest use of state taxpayer dollars to cover proveable shortfalls in each library’s budget. Just don’t legislatively command that a set percentage has to be spent each year.
This seems to me to be what gets us into overspending in a multitude of areas of government. The politicians serving now are told by law you must spend as an example, 22 percent of your budget on whatever so the citizens feeling overtaxed go to their politicians and say cut this area of the budget and are told we can’t, our hands are tied!
The word “free” is used twice in paragraph two and it always makes me shake my head and say free when you walk through the door but someone (see taxpayers) is being commanded to pay for these things.
It’s been a number of years since I’ve written on this topic, 1999 or 2000 or thereabouts. The year we had the county wide library tax that was called to revote and was rejected after a more thorough debate. Ah, those were the heady days of direct democracy. As we stand here in mid-2008 with it costing 50 to more than 100 dollars to fill the family vehicle, food costs jumping up, etc., consumers are being financially choked or close to it at this point.
My point to end on for now is this- with greatly increased costs for necessities we’d better buckle down and put some real cutbacks in place so that maybe people will be able to heat their homes next fall and winter.
Sincerely,
Edwin Allen Jr., Starrucca, Pa.