Privatizing Libraries

Private-Library-713

Expanding our thinking about the notion of
corporate-run community libraries

Consider the following scenario. Two years from now in November, you find yourself walking into a voting booth to decide on the fate of your local library. The issue you will be deciding affects you directly because it has to do with the management of your local library. You will be voting on one of four choices for the operational management of your library. The choices you have to pick from include Microsoft, Google, Apple, or your current city-run operation.

Rest assured, this is not some takeover bid by one of these three companies to steal libraries away from their local constituency. Rather, it is a very considered offer to both manage and invest in your local library, while at the same time, extending the influence of their companies.

Let’s face it; the recent economic times have not been kind to community libraries. Many have had to cut staff and cut services in order to keep their doors open. Several libraries systems have had to close branches, while other standalone libraries have had little choice but to close their doors.

While many in the library community may see this as cause for alarm, I would like to open a conversation on how a situation like this can be turned into an opportunity.

While it may be possible to find a combination of paid services and corporate sponsorships to transition a community library off the public tax roles, there may be some more appealing options for allowing corporations to operate public libraries.

Before anyone begins assigning labels of “right” or “wrong,” I would like to engage you in ways to thread-the-needle of possibilities and see if there are any balancing acts that may indeed make sense.

It’s important to keep in mind that corporations will have some sort of profit motive in the background, so the best approach will be to formulate some form of win-win strategy so both the corporation and the community benefit from the relationship.

Library Assets

To begin with, there are many valuable assets that libraries have that businesses will find appealing. Here are a few that come to mind:

“Corporate-Branded” Libraries

Keeping these assets in mind, let’s begin to explore what strategies may come into play with “corporate branded” libraries. Each corporation will bring with them their own corporate culture, their own way of doing things, and, of course, their own agenda.

Please note that this is merely conjecture on my part. I do not claim any insider knowledge about their future plans.

These, of course, are but a few of the possible players in this space.

If any of this seems inconceivable or too unwieldy for one company to take on, let’s look at the math. There are approximately 16,000 libraries across the U.S. If a company set out to privatize 1,600 or 10% of them, focusing on small to medium sized libraries with a per library budget of $2 million, the total expenditure would be $3.2 billion. While this is a rather significant number, it is indeed within the realm of possibilities, especially if there is a way to derive a profit from some aspect of the operation.

Keep in mind that the community will likely still be contributing money to the operation of the library, so the corporation may only have to add some supplemental funds which it will likely view as marketing dollars.

Setting the Boundaries

As with any type of agreement, the first task needs to involve thinking through both the upside and the downside of the arrangement.

In many respects, this type of agreement is no different than what a city will set up with a cable television franchise, electric and gas providers, or even garbage collection.

It is important to establish a series of guidelines to address key operational issues on the front end.

The Upside and the Downside

With corporate run libraries, I can see both positive and negative sides to the arguments.

On the positive side, they have the potential to become better managed libraries. Corporations will inject their own unique kind of creativity into the system.

Librarians will likely be better trained and paid a higher salary. The public will benefit from better resources, better programs, and access to cutting edge thinking and technology.

On the negative side, corporations have traditionally been very heavy-handed in their attempts to make a profit, so in this type of situation, some formerly free services may begin to cost money. Over time there may be a growing tension between the corporation and local citizens, and virtually every change becomes closely scrutinized by the public. The biggest downside happens if the corporation ignores the needs of the community and wields a heavy-handed corporate agenda.

Most companies are very wary of anything that could cause damage to their reputation, so most of the extreme scenarios are not too likely.

If the arrangement is structured properly up front, and the community retains ownership of the facility and veto power over any egregious violations, this could indeed become a win-win arrangement for everyone involved.

In fact, the best possible arrangement might be if 2-3 companies get very competitive about running libraries with each trying to outdo the other. In that kind of situation, we all win.

By Futurist Thomas Frey