Mayor Pro Tem seeks to save Garland library

Interim County Manager Jeffery Hudson has informed Garland Mayor Austin Brown that the county is heavily considering closing down their local library. The town of Garland has already been financially responsible for the bills of the library such as water and electric. Mayor Pro Tem Ralph Smith Jr. proposes that the town and community do everything in its power to save the cherished library.

He said that the Miriam Lamb Memorial Library has been one of the few things citizens and students can visit to occupy their time in the town of Garland. It also serves as a destination for those who don’t have the luxury of owning a computer or have internet services at their home. Though attendance may not be as high as it once was, it still serves the community.

A proposal that was made in order to keep the library open is to use a part of the town fund to pay the librarians and staff instead of hiring more deputies to patrol the town. Smith believes that choice belongs to the citizens of Garland. “Ultimately it’s going to be our decision, but we’ve got to listen to the people of this town. These guys pay the bills, we have to listen to them,” Smith stated. “If they want to keep the library, then by God, let’s find a way to keep it up. It’s just that simple.”

Commissioner Jo Strickland raised concerns about not increasing the law enforcement prescence instead of allocating the funds to the library. “What do you anticipate for us to do [when] we’re coming up on the worst season of the year as far as crime, as far as we’re having field workers come in, what is your plan to keep us safe as possible?” she asked.

Smith’s rebuttal to that, “We pay county tax to the sheriff’s department, all of us do. We shouldn’t have to beg them to come out for a call, that’s the first and foremost. Second is, yes, we may be in our busiest traffic part of the year, we should’ve spent our money wiser in the summer than the winter.”

Strickland then replied, “When we started with the sheriff department here, we started with a $60,000 budget. The year that I budgeted so well, they decided to take that 15 (thousand) that was left over, and take it out of the budget for the next year.”

The mayor pro tem motioned, which was passed, to table the matter being that there are many factors that are included with the complexity of the town’s budget, and strongly urged that the board needs to hear input from the community. One community member was present during the meeting to speak her concerns.

Mary Smith, a citizen of Garland, spoke during public comments regarding the potential closure of the library. “It’s one of our last resources our town has to offer, not just for the children, but people overall. The services are free, so if there’s any way possible to keep our library open, I would certainly appreciate it as do the youth,” she said.

“We can take all the money we want and bump it into the sheriff’s department and close the library, but can we cut the sheriff’s department back and keep the library on a limited schedule? The answer to that is yes,” Smith stated. “We can kind of split it up more even. We’re gonna lose certain days the police could have been here, but we’re gonna have a library. The public needs to make that decision. It’s their town, it’s their money,” he continued.

He also attested to the purpose it serves to the community. “We have people that go up there that use Wi-Fi that otherwise wouldn’t have any service at all. In the summertime we have people that offer transportation for programs that the library offers that we don’t have. God knows there’s not enough for children to do as there is, and that’s countywide, not just Garland. Whatever little bit we can do, I’m all for it.”

He concluded by saying, “I think libraries are a valuable asset to all communities, and it’s a place where people can get factual information unlike all this false information spread on Facebook and stuff like that. You can go to the library, read the newspaper, they can look up things, they have access to so many educational tools. It’s a thing that kids can get involved with. We we’re sitting here talking about kids getting in trouble, well, give them something else to do.”