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Bookmobile program in funding crisis County, RAD balk at cost of service Sunday, October 21, 2001 By Johnna A. Pro, Post-Gazette Staff Writer
When Rosemary Mahalchak began searching for a videotape of a film called "Breathing Lessons," she expected to find it rather easily because it was made recently, had well-known stars and was filmed, in part, around Pittsburgh.
But after a five-month search through bookstores, libraries and video stores, Mahalchak gave up hope of finding the 1994 made-for-TV movie starring James Garner and Joanne Woodward.
Then, just as she does one Tuesday each month, Mahalchak walked over to the Bookmobile when it stopped at the Chartiers Senior Resource Center in Carnegie, a few blocks from her home.
Tucked on a lower shelf in the mobile library's video section was "Breathing Lessons."
"When I saw it here, I almost fell on the floor," said Mahalchak, a youthful 77-year-old with a flair for the dramatic who was at the Bookmobile last week returning the tape. " 'Oh, my God,' I said. 'Here it is -- the movie I've been looking for for months.' "
Mahalchak, though, and other Bookmobile patrons now are worried that with Allegheny County eliminating its funding for the five mobile libraries, and the Regional Asset District board balking at picking up the cost -- $825,000 for next year -- the service that has been around since 1957 will go out of existence.
Unless the Allegheny County Library Association can persuade the county or the RAD board to pick up the cost, or come up with some other funding plan, the Bookmobiles could be out of service as early as January.
"It's no longer a line item in the county budget," said Allegheny County's spokeswoman, Margaret Philbin. "While they are an important asset, we think they should be funded by the Regional Asset District."
RAD board members don't necessarily agree.
They were infuriated that the county tossed the issue into their lap and said so publicly when the library association submitted a funding request to them on behalf of the Bookmobiles.
RAD Executive Director David Donahoe said that, for the past four decades, the Bookmobiles have been the stepchild of the library system. They have been funded by the county but administered by the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh through a separate contract, not as part of the Carnegie's general operating budget. At this point, nobody is able to absorb the full cost of funding them.
"ACLA has become kind of the shepherd of the Bookmobiles," Donahoe said. "I think it's obviously clear to them they may have to come back with some other proposal."
Donahoe said the RAD board looked at the broad picture, particularly when it comes to funding.
According to Donahoe, 30 percent of the RAD budget for 2002 -- a total of $22.6 million -- would be spent on the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh and the Allegheny County Library Association for smaller community libraries. In addition, the Carnegie and ACLA will get $10 million in various state funds, according to the information they submitted to the RAD, Donahoe said.
"That's $32 million of either district or state revenue. No one's called that in to play," Donahoe said.
Marilyn Jenkins, executive director of the ACLA, will make a second appeal to the RAD tomorrow at its public hearing on the preliminary budget.
In addition, the library association plans to appeal to Allegheny County Council later this week, hoping that, with enough support on council, some or all of the money eliminated by the Roddey administration will be restored in the 2002 budget.
Jenkins said she understood the financial pinch facing the county and the RAD, but that she was confident a plan could be put together to save the Bookmobiles.
"We're working with the possible funders and trying to find a deal that will work for everyone," Jenkins said. "It's a tough time for the RAD, the county. Everybody's budget is tight."
Jenkins said that if the ACLA could get funding for 2002, it could spend next year trying to find new ways to pay for the Bookmobile services.
"That's what we've said to RAD, to the county," Jenkins said. "We're not in the position to eliminate everything, then come back in a couple of years and start over. We're hoping to get funds for one more year while we rethink what we're doing and target the service in the most effective way possible."
The Bookmobiles serve 24 communities each week, including poor communities such as Duquesne and Rankin; far-flung communities such as West Deer, Plum and Elizabeth Borough; and communities with either no library or small developing libraries. In addition, the Bookmobile stops at 19 senior citizen centers and nearly two dozen Head Start programs once a month.
Patrons borrow books, movies, tapes, books on tape and compact discs and, as of Sept. 30, had taken out 121,231 items from the Bookmobiles this year. The mobile libraries have 115,217 items available to borrow, which would make them the county's ninth-largest library.
Normally, there are five Bookmobiles in the fleet, but one is out of service after a fire earlier this year.
From biographies to Bing Crosby, patrons know that the Bookmobile will have it, and if they don't have the it, the staff can order items from any library in the country.
Connie Galbreath, a Carnegie Library employee who manages the Bookmobile Center in the West End, believes the ACLA will be successful finding money for next year.
"I'm an optimist," Galbreath said. "I'm counting on the county and RAD to come together in some sort of agreement. I think they all realize how important the service is."
Mahalchak hopes the ACLA is successful, too. And she's not alone.
At Kenmawr Plaza in Kennedy, where there is no library, Paula Kochis had her tote bag in tow, along with her daughter Juliana, 5, when she visited the Bookmobile parked there for its weekly seven-hour shift.
Kochis has been patronizing the Bookmobile since her son Michael, 8, was a baby.
He's now a fan of books that are awarded The Caldecott Medal for illustration. Juliana, who grabs a book and happily shows off her reading ability, said she liked to read any book. Kochis has no doubt it's because of the Bookmobile.
"They really work with you, and it's very convenient," said Kochis, who selects books for the children, and a video for the family's Friday at-home movie nights. "We come every week. As a parent, I think this is so important."
"Ooh. It would be a disaster if they closed. I wouldn't like it at all," said Arlene Kikel of Kennedy, who raised three children, now in their 20s, on the Bookmobile services at Kenmawr Plaza.
Bookmobile driver Charlotte Maegle knows Kikel's children and was concerned that Kikel's daughter had been ill recently. Kikel stopped to share the happy news that her daughter was on the mend.
Part of the appeal of the Bookmobile is that it's more than just a moving library. In communities where it stops, it has become an extension of the neighborhood, a place to congregate and visit, like the church hall or the local grocery store.
"Oh, people tell me everything," Maegle said. "I talk to everybody."
County Councilman James E. Simms, who chairs council's budget and finance committee, is an advocate of the Bookmobiles and sees a need for them, even in today's highly mobile, computerized world.
He's convinced that the Bookmobile statistics are telling about the number of people who rely on the service. He sees the Bookmobiles as a quality-of-life issue for those in poor or rural areas of the county and places without libraries.
Simms, for one, believes there is room in the county's proposed $657 million operating budget to pay for the service, or at least a portion of it. Councilwoman Eileen Wagner also champions the Bookmobiles' cause.
"We do agree between the administration and council not to disturb the bottom line," Simms said. "But within that amount, there's room to reshape the priorities. This is just a good cause."
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