Financial bind may sever library's mutual ties

NEW TAMPA — For 12 years, public libraries around Tampa Bay have proudly served borrowers from neighboring counties for free. Now the cooperation may be breaking down.

The Tampa-Hillsborough Public Library Board has recommended that Hillsborough County withdraw from the arrangement because its north Hillsborough libraries are devoting so much staff time to serving Pasco County residents.

Those residents account for one-fourth of the materials borrowed from the Lutz Branch Library, one-tenth from Odessa's Austin Davis Library and more than one-sixth from the New Tampa Regional Library, the second busiest Hillsborough library.

Hillsborough's decision would seal off its books, CDs and DVDs to all non-Hillsborough residents. They could use Hills­borough libraries but could borrow materials only by ordering them through their home-county libraries or by paying Hillsborough an annual $100 nonresident fee.

"I'm sorry to hear that," said Linda Allen, Pasco County's director of libraries. "But if I were in the similar position, I would make the same decision."

In the fiscal year that ended in September, Hillsborough residents borrowed 2,180 items from Pasco libraries while Pasco residents borrowed 260,286 items from Hillsborough libraries.

Librarians have expressed pride in the widespread system of sharing among bay area counties.

"I was one of the librarians that helped start it," said Joe Stines, director of the Tampa-Hillsborough system. "But when it gets so unbalanced, I can't defend it."

The proposal has been triggered partly by revenue squeezes among local governments coping with property tax rollbacks. Stines' staff has calculated the change would allow it to eliminate 21/2 jobs, saving about $93,000.

Like other county department heads, Stines has submitted the proposal in a larger batch of cutbacks to County Administrator Pat Bean, who could not be reached Tuesday. The proposal and accompanying fee would apply to all neighboring counties, not just Pasco.

This isn't the first time one county in the agreement has felt overburdened.

Before Hillsborough finished its Upper Tampa Bay Regional Library in 2004, many residents of the Westchase area used the Oldsmar Library in Pinellas, Stines said. Then, as Oldsmar outgrew its library, its residents came to Upper Tampa Bay. In January, Oldsmar formally opened a new library.

"There's a good balance between the Hillsborough and Pinellas county line," said Mary Brown, executive director of the Pinellas Public Library Cooperative. That also applies to the Pinellas-Pasco line, Brown said. "We don't see a huge impact there," she said.

But she sympathized with Hillsborough's dilemma.

"The downside to that is, it's going to hurt the relationship between two counties," Brown said.

On Tuesday, the Times interviewed several Pasco residents — whose tax dollars fund only Pasco's libraries — at the New Tampa and Lutz libraries. Everyone paused at the prospect of paying Hillsborough $100 a year.

"That stinks completely," said Pam Winterfeld of Pasco's Meadow Pointe, which has thousands of homes along the Hillsborough line in New Tampa. "Something's rotten in Denmark. ... That's not fair at all."

Winterfeld reads several mystery novels every week from the New Tampa library, the closest to her house, and the Lutz library, where she shops at a pair of consignment stores to stock her thrift shop in Zephyrhills.

Melissa Martin of New Tampa, mother of an infant and a tot, checks out 10 to 20 books a month from the New Tampa library. She's planning to move to Winterfeld's development in Pasco. She considered the $100.

"I don't know," said Martin, who's taking a year off as an elementary school teacher. "I'd have to check out the Pasco libraries."

Pasco officials say that while they have an award-winning library system, it hasn't kept pace with growth.

Pasco owns 5 acres for a library just north of Meadow Pointe in Wesley Chapel, but can't afford to build.

"We desperately need a new library in Wesley Chapel," said Allen, the Pasco libraries director. "At this moment, there's no way we're going to get a new library in Wesley Chapel."

Allen also would like a library in Trinity, which would serve Pasco residents now using Hillsborough's branch in Odessa.

"We're waiting for a turnaround in the economy," she said. "And when it comes, we'll build a new library in Wesley Chapel."

"If it comes, I will go there," said Mina Bhatt, a retired bank teller in Meadow Pointe, who uses the New Tampa library. "I hope it becomes a reality in my lifetime."

Bill Coats can be reached at (813) 269-5309 or coats@sptimes.com.

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