The creative project I'm working on has brought home the value of local libraries, and past work as an employee of The Library Company of Philadelphia installed that understanding years ago.
In mid-December, I'd republished the South Dakota Searchlight article, Noem's proposed SD State Library budget cut would hamstring local libraries, opponents say.
Today, commentary about the issue republished from the South Dakota Searchlight. And yes, I have a library card with the Wilmont Public Library. Like Library Company founder Benjamin Franklin and his peers, and West River commentator Mary Garrigan, I appreciate the value of a library.
State cut could hurt local library resources ranging from dishwasher research to genealogy
by Mary GarriganMy dishwasher is on its deathbed, so I did what I always do when I need to purchase a new household appliance. I went to my local library, logged into the Consumer Reports online database and researched which dishwashers get top ratings.
I don’t pay for a subscription to Consumer Reports magazine, but the Rapid City Public Library does. Since I’m a Pennington County taxpayer with a library card, I can browse its digital version whenever I want to make an important consumer purchase. It’s just one of the many things I love about the Rapid City library. (I could even choose to read about dishwasher ratings from the comfort of my home computer armed only with my library card number, but I really like libraries, so I use any excuse to visit mine.)
Like most library lovers in South Dakota, I don’t much care for Gov. Kristi Noem’s recent proposal to cut the South Dakota State Library’s 2026 fiscal year budget by $1 million (more than $2 million, if you count the $1.3 million in federal funding that the State Library may lose if it is unable to leverage federal grants with the required local match.) If the budget reduction is approved, more than half of its staff would be cut.
With the 2025 legislative session underway in Pierre, I’m counting on the fact that there are lots of other public library patrons who will let legislators know that they don’t like Noem’s cuts either.
South Dakota has about 130 libraries, branch libraries and bookmobiles (not counting school libraries) that serve the public in communities large and small. About 90% of all South Dakotans have access to a local library, even if only about 40% of us bother to register for a library card, according to 2023 statistics gathered by the State Library. Plenty more visit their local library without bothering to get a card.
Libraries are typically funded by local governments, but every single one of them benefits from the resources and services that the South Dakota State Library and its staff provides thanks to state funding. Chief among those benefits are the approximately 50 online databases whose subscriptions are paid for with State Library funds. Access to these databases is free of charge to all public and school libraries in our state, regardless of whether they are located in Sioux Falls or Sturgis, Bison or Beresford.
They provide a vast array of information to users: educational research, recreational reading and viewing, historical data, job training, financial literacy, public records, art, music and language resources, consumer information — the list goes on and on. With these digital resources, you can write a school term paper, study for your driver’s license or the college SAT, learn the basics of starting a small business, find simple legal forms, research your family’s genealogy — or even find the best new dishwasher. In other words, if you have a question, the State Library probably has an electronic database that can help you find the answer.
A recently retired middle school librarian I know is aghast at how the loss of database access will affect public schools. It would gut the educational resources that she used regularly to teach her students.
Subscriptions to these databases are not cheap. With an annual budget of about $4 million, my library can afford to purchase some of its own database subscriptions, supplementing the state list with another 25 subscriptions that it pays for out of its own budget — including my beloved Consumer Reports.
But most South Dakota libraries are small, with small budgets, says Tina Hamlin, director of the Hyde County Library in Highmore. I grew up in that library, back when it was open all day and on Saturdays, too. With an annual budget of about $80,000, it’s all Hamlin can do to keep the library doors open 25 hours a week now. The library’s card catalog is still maintained by hand, not computer, and there’s no room in her limited budget for any database subscriptions. Even the library’s website, where patrons currently access these databases, was created with funding and tech support from the State Library, so she also worries about paying to maintain that in the future.
If the State Library staff is slashed, Hamlin will miss the trainings and resources that jumpstart the children’s reading program each summer. But the biggest impact could be losing access to the interlibrary loan services that the state staff coordinates through its Share It program. “We can request any book that a reader wants, as long as it’s not a brand new copyright,” Hamlin said.
Highmore readers borrow about 70 books per year through interlibrary loan, she estimates. That saves the library the cost of adding those requested books to its own collection, especially if they are of limited interest.
Larger libraries, which move hundreds of books each month through interlibrary loan, will face huge increases in postage costs if the courier service paid for by the State Library ends.
I assume that the State Library, like every government agency, has some fat in its budget. Some of its databases may not be used enough to justify their expense, and an annual review of those subscriptions is a good idea. But to gut the staff and budget of an agency that does so much to support these essential communal spaces throughout South Dakota seems cruel to me.
Public libraries are on the frontlines of many social issues today, from childcare shortages to homelessness to mental health challenges to rural isolation. They deserve more taxpayer support, not less. What does it say about a state that can find $825 million, ready and waiting in a fund, to pay for a new prison, but is too short-sighted to spend $1 million to keep information, education and entertainment available to all of its citizens through libraries? It says, sadly, get ready to fund even more prisons in the future.
As Gov. Noem exits state government soon for national duties, the South Dakota Legislature and its new governor should re-evaluate this unwise policy decision.
Photo: The library at Lakota Tech High School on the Pine Ridge Reservation. (John Hult/South Dakota Searchlight).
This South Dakota Searchlight article is republished online under Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-ND 4.0.
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