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Found out my town's library spends more on late fees than new books
Honestly, I was looking at the public budget report online last week and saw the line item for the library. They spent $27,000 on collecting late fees last year, but only $15,000 on buying new books. It blew my mind. I always thought the fees were just a small thing to get people to return stuff, not a real money maker. Now I'm thinking the whole system is backwards and just punishes people who can't afford it. Has anyone else seen something like this in their city?
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sageross28d ago
terry_lewis21's comment about donations going up after dropping fees - I actually read an article about that exact thing happening in a bunch of libraries across the country. It said fines create this weird cycle where poor people avoid the library altogether because they're scared of getting charged, so the library misses out on donations and foot traffic. Makes sense they'd spend more on tracking late fees than books when they're busy treating patrons like criminals instead of customers. The whole model seems designed to punish people who can't afford to just buy the dang book on Amazon instead of borrowing it.
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terry_lewis211mo ago
Wait, is your library still charging late fees? Ours got rid of them a couple years back. They just lock your card if a book is way overdue, and donations for new books went way up after they stopped. People actually bring stuff back now because they aren't scared of the fine.
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