Weekend re-opening sought for Downtown Library Weekend re-opening sought for Downtown Library (June 25, 2004)
Last year at this time, an aggressive last-minute political push by bookworms caught the attention of Palo Alto City Council members, who agreed to not close the College Terrace branch on Saturdays, as had been planned.

This year, the library advocates are hoping to do the same for Downtown Library. Reopening that branch on Saturday would cost at least $17,500.

The City Council decided to close that branch two days a week last week to save funds. That means the library is completely inaccessible on weekends.

"If you work and live in the neighborhood, you're never going to be able to get to the library," said Jeff Levisnky, the president of the Friends of the Palo Alto Libraries, who is leading the charge. "We think that this is something that's very important to the community."

The push does not have the full support of new Library Director Paula Simpson, who will likely have higher priorities needs to push in the future.

"I'm really hoping that they kind of scale back their effort until we have a chance to talk" about the overall needs of the library, she said last week. Simpson has been meeting with residents and groups in the past few months to learn of the library's needs.

The entire five-branch library system suffers from a lack of funding for staff members, leading librarians to be overworked. Plus, many of the facilities lack space for collections. --Bill D'Agostino

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