Don’t forget that the Downtown Spokane Public Library is now open on Mondays from 10am-6pm. It was closed Mondays in 2005 due to severe budget cuts. I want to thank Director Pat Partovi for working hard to expand open hours during these tough economic times – the times when people need access to books, computers and employment services even more! The Library is able to do this because of investment in self service technologies, enabling them to use fewer staff on desk at one time and spreading out the existing staff to cover more hours during the week.

Administrative and Support Services staff that are housed in the Downtown Library will fill in for unanticipated absences. (It is having these staff on hand that makes opening an extra day possible without increasing the budget. Although I would really love to see the Hillyard Branch and other neighborhood branches open an extra half day/week, it is almost impossible to do this without hiring on additional staff because there aren’t any “extra” bodies in those buildings to spread out or to fill in when someone is out). I’ll be getting a briefing and tour of the entire Downtown library soon and I’ll ask more questions about ways we can get creative with extending the hours of our branches!