Sign Our Petition
To the NYS Senate and Assembly:
We the undersigned are calling upon our elected officials to protect NY’s libraries and library systems and reject the $2.4 million cut in Library Aid Governor David Paterson is proposing in the 2010-2011 Executive Budget.
This will be the fifth cut in less than two years and will bring Library Aid down from $102 million in 2007 to $84.5 million in 2010. These cuts combined total an $18 million or 18% reduction in funding for library services. Libraries are part of our safety net.
Libraries and the systems that support them are essential community services. From life long learning to jobs and opportunity and from quality of life to community empowerment, our libraries and library systems can not afford any more cuts. In fact, cutting aid to libraries and library systems is not the answer. No other state funded program serves so many people (over 75% of New York households and getting larger) with so little state funding (less than one tenth of one percent of the state budget and getting smaller). Over the past three years 97% of local library budget referendums have been approved by the voters. Your constituents overwhelming support our local libraries and, you can too by stopping further state cuts to library services.