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This editorial in the Hartford Courant advocates for the state budget to not slash the money allocated for the borrowIT CT/deliverIT CT program (formerly known as CCar). Please take a minute to read this editorial. As always, we greatly appreciate the support our community gives to the library!

Editorial: Library Cut Too Deep

By Editorial Contact Reporter

With state finances in such rough shape, everyone knows that some state-funded programs must go. But Gov. Dannel P. Malloy has proposed cutting all funding — a relatively small amount — for a wildly popular and invaluable program that lets people take out materials from any public library in the state. That’s a cut too deep.

The state invested about $781,000 in the “borrowIT CT” program (formerly known as Connecticard, such a better name) last year. The governor’s proposed budget for next year slashes that to zero.

What does it pay for?

Consider a library patron in Glastonbury who goes into the venerable Welles-Turner Memorial Library on Main Street looking for a recent John Grisham novel, but all copies have been checked out. Hartford Public Library, though, has a copy on the shelf.

Thanks to the borrowIT program, the person in Glastonbury can either drive to the Hartford library and pick up the book, or they can request that the book be sent to Welles-Turner, where they can pick it up in a day or two. The Connecticut State Library, though the “deliverIT CT” program (formerly “Connecticar”), handles the transportation.

The service is especially valuable in towns that neighbor larger cities or those that serve as regional libraries. In 2017, more than 8,000 items were loaned from Hagaman Memorial Library in East Haven to patrons from New Haven — often children or adults with low incomes who cannot easily access the New Haven Free Public Library but are within walking distance of the East Haven library.

The borrowIT program compensates the loaning libraries for the costs associated with essentially providing services to people from out of town — staff time, operations time, the cost of materials. Once a year, libraries submit figures to the state detailing how many items they loaned though the service, and the pool of money is split among them proportionally. For some libraries in high demand, that money adds up — sometimes tens of thousands of dollars to supplement their own materials budgets.

The deliverIT program is supported by a federal grant of about $400,000 that is available only if the state maintains a program such as borrowIT. Without enough borrowIT funding in place, the grant could be in jeopardy. Eliminating the borrowIT funding could mean the end of inter-library loan in Connecticut.

What a shame the idea is even being entertained.

Through the borrowIT CT program, nearly 3.9 million items were loaned to non-residents last year. The numbers have slipped a bit since the peak of the recession in 2010, when nearly 5 million items were loaned. But since the program was founded in the mid-1970s, about 140 million loans have been reported.

The deliverIT program estimates that it moves 15,000 items a day, making an average of 848 stops per week, and has served more than 1.5 million patrons. The state library estimates that it has saved some $9 million in postage if those items had been mailed.

Legislators show their priorities by how they spend their money. Far better for Connecticut to be known as a place with first-class libraries than as a place with overly generous benefits for state employees.

The state budget should include enough funding for the borrowIT program so that the federal grant isn’t jeopardized. A strong library system is an essential part of the suite of services that makes people want to stay in Connecticut — or even move here.