Fairfield library continues ?weeding? its collection

A priority for the Fairfield Public Library continues to be weeding its collection to reduce the median age of available literature.

?The gold standard for a public library?s collection is to have a median age of five years,? library director Rebecca Huggins told the Fairfield City Council during her annual report Monday. ?You can achieve that five year median age two ways: you can add material that?s irresistible to your borrowers and you can cull the collection of materials that are not of interest, not circulating and outdated.?

Several sections of the Fairfield library have median ages of 20 years or older. With funding from the city and library foundation, local school librarians Dee Ann Lantz and Tricia Slechta were hired to help weed the collections.

?At our current level of funding, we?re going to be able to achieve a 10-year median age in the coming eight-year period. This is a big ship that turns very slowly,? Huggins said.

Overall, she said, ?it was a productive year,? with the library partnering with local groups and organizations on a number of community initiatives.

Some necessary repairs were made to the 15-year-old library building, and all the lamps and ballasts were replaced as part of the city?s energy efficiency project. In addition to saving energy, the new lamps also provide better lighting.

Huggins reported a decrease in the library?s utility bill, but explained the lamps are not the sole cause. The library took several cost-cutting measures before they were installed, she said.

?We were one of seven local entities that received bequests from the Frank McClurg estate,? Huggins said. The $380,914 bequest increased the library?s endowment fund to $856,662.

?In light of that donation, our foundation has unanimously agreed that instead of just focusing on capital expenditures that they are willing to augment our materials budget,? Huggins said.

During the 2011 fiscal year, the library spent $39,026 on new materials. The library?s adult fiction collection increased from 15,086 to 15,824 books; adult large type increased from 2,972 to 3,065; young adult fiction increased from 1,362 to 1,497; and DVDs increased from 3,770 to 4,492. The library now has 4,045 e-books available for checkout.

?Under total circulation, it doesn?t look so great. It looks as though we had quite a dip from 186,000 [fiscal year 2010] to 177,000 [fiscal year 2011],? Huggins said. ?The good news is from July 1 of this year through the end of November, when you annualize our circulation, it?s actually higher than the 185,000. We?ve exceeded that at this point, so we?re not worried about it.?

City administrator Jeff Clawson has asked the library to prepare a five-year capital plan by the end of this month. Huggins said computers will be a key element.

?The computers in the library were purchased in 2006. We recently replaced our servers, and we?re running on Microsoft Office 2003 programs and Windows XP. We will need to make an upgrade in the near future,? Huggins said.