Library Corner

I’ve never received so much mail in my entire life. While I’m not quite at the same level as Santa Claus, almost every day when I arrive at work I have a new magazine waiting for me or, more commonly, multiple envelopes screaming in bold red ink, “Don’t miss an issue. Renew today!”

As a library assistant II at East Adams County Library District, one of my main duties is purchasing and managing 40-plus subscriptions. The library subscribes to magazines covering a wide range of subjects from automobiles, “Car & Driver;” to Zags, “Sports Illustrated;” for every age from baby, “Pregnancy & Newborn;” to boomer, “World War II;’ and every interesting title in between from the old guard, “National Geographic;” to the new, “The Magnolia Journal.’ We also subscribe to four different local/regional newspapers, including this one.

It’s my job to make sure the library offers our community a wide range of publications that cater to our patron’s interests while also paying attention to our bottom line… and that’s where my job gets really interesting.

“The publishing industry is dying!”

We’ve all heard this phrase a time or two since the internet has become our go to source for up-to-the-minute news, sports, and pop culture.

And while we’ve witnessed the last issues of many newspapers and magazines in the past 20 years — either choosing to switch to a digital format only (hello, Seattle Post Intelligencer (SeattlePI.com) or shutter completely (RIP “Ladies’ Home Journal”) — we haven’t yet witnessed a true print apocalypse.

That said, there have certainly been some marked changes. More and more periodicals are shifting to combined or quarterly issues, weeklies are becoming bi-weekly and in some cases have even switched to only a once a month publication. All the while, prices stay the same or, more-often-than-not, increase.

In November, we were notified, a regional newspaper would be increasing our subscription rate over 100%. A one-year subscription will now consume over a quarter of our annual periodical budget. In the end, we realized our region’s largest publication is too valuable of a commodity for our patrons to lose.

Besides The Ritzville Adams County Journal, our daily regional newspaper is the most thumbed through periodical in our collection.

Unfortunately, this means we will likely have to cancel subscriptions to a handful of other publications or find more economical options in order to balance out.

Years ago, our library joined a growing national trend among libraries to no longer charge overdue fines for late materials. Whenever a patron comes in now profusely apologizing as they return their stack of overdue materials, we are genuinely happy to let them know that they don’t owe us any overdue fines while cheerfully reminding them that donations, however, are always welcome. Our little donation box on the front counter isn’t just for when you feel bad about late items though. It helps us buy supplies for children’s program, purchase new DVDs, and now we’ll probably have to start dipping into some of those donations to help ease the pain of the increasingly rising costs of subscriptions.

And if you regularly find yourself in our periodical section, checking out or just thumbing through the latest issues, you might find it worthwhile to add something to the donation box. It’ll still be less than the cost of a personal subscription, and will allow the library to continue to provide the community with a wide selection of titles for everyone to enjoy.

Feeling truly generous? Contact me at 659-1222 or [email protected] to discuss sponsoring a year’s subscription of one of our many popular titles!