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Tuesday August 2, 2011

 
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Whither the Library

The City of Toronto is facing down a serious budget shortfall. And as city council looks for places to cut, councilor Doug Ford, the brother of Mayor Rob Ford, started counting library branches. Today we look at the debate over balancing the books by closing libraries.


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Today's guest host was Jim Brown.


Part One of The Current

Satire

It's Tuesday, August 2.

U.S. President Barack Obama appears to have averted a financial collapse with a deal to get the U.S. debt ceiling raised.

Currently, he also appears to have built himself a custom-made sinkhole for the next Presidential election.

This Is The Current.

Whither the Library: Ken Roberts

Under normal circumstances you wouldn't have to choose between libraries and coffee shops. But in the City of Toronto, these aren't normal times. The city is facing down a serious budget shortfall.

And as city council looks for places to cut, councilor Doug Ford, the brother of Mayor Rob Ford, started counting library branches and Tim Hortons outlets. Now, his math was off. There are actually about three Tim Hortons for every one library branch in his neighbourhood.

But his comments have unleashed a fierce debate over the value and the future of libraries ... a debate that is already being fueled by questions about the role libraries play in the internet era, when so much information is readily available from just about anywhere.

We began with Ken Roberts, the Chief Librarian at the Hamilton Public Library and the former President of the Canadian Library Association. He was in Hamilton, Ontario.

Whither the Library: Sarah Doucette

Sarah Doucette is a City Councilor in Toronto, where cutting library branches is being floated as an option. She also sits on the board of the Toronto Public Library and she was in Toronto.

Whither the Library: Julia Donaldson

Canadian libraries aren't the only ones under pressure. In Britain, almost 200 libraries have closed over the last decade, and another 350 are now on the chopping block.

Julia Donaldson is the author of several best-selling children's books, including The Gruffalo and Stick Man. She's also the United Kingdom's Children's Laureate and this morning she was in Edinburgh, Scotland.

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