Tennessee: Chattanooga Public Library Director Introduces New Strategy

From the Chattanooga Times Free Press:

Standing before a seated group on the top floor of a library, her library, Corinne Hill offered a cold eulogy.
“A library that clerks these huge warehouses of stuff with that musty smell where you were always just a ‘Shhhh’ away from getting in trouble?” Hill started. “Absolutely that library is dead. It’s gone. It’s over.”
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Now, it’s for meetings. It’s a community space, one she doesn’t want to define until the citizens define it themselves. The rest of the Public Library needs to change, too, she said. It needs to push the use of technology further. It needs to emphasize customer service more.
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For the most part, Hill said, the library can make these changes without increased funding. Since she took over, she has shifted how it spends money. She stopped paying for reference books that tell you everything you need to know about American companies, for example, because Hill thinks people can find that information online for free. She also stopped paying for some publications like medical journals because, she said, doctors and med school students aren’t exactly rushing to the public library to learn the newest developments in neuroscience.

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See Also: Chattanooga Public Library Cooking Up Creativity (September 18, 2012)
Hat Tip: @mattrweaver

Filed under: Funding, Libraries, News, Public Libraries