Letters Letters (September 28, 2005)

Library improvements underway

Editor,

A recent writer stated, "The public part of the Downtown (branch of the Palo Alto City) Library has been reduced to little more than a book drop" and asserted that I have a "plan to move to a grandiose showplace library instead of improving neighborhood libraries" (Weekly, Sept. 9).

Both of these statements are untrue. We are trying, as limited resources allow, to make positive changes at all of the libraries. At the downtown branch, more computers and wireless Internet access have been added, the children's area has been expanded, and a small meeting room is being created.

The checkout area at the Mitchell Park Library was remodeled last year and significant improvements will soon be undertaken at the Main Library. A major renovation/expansion of the Children's Library will begin in early 2006.

I don't have a plan for a grandiose showplace, or, as yet, for anything at all. My job is to help our community identify and implement its library vision. The Palo Alto City Library has been in a slow downward spiral for years, but the sad pattern can be reversed if we work together.

I would love to see the energy of everyone who has an opinion about library service in Palo Alto directed positively, toward achieving a sustainable library plan.

The library is the heart of our community. Let's please work together in a spirit of collaboration to support and improve it.
Paula Simpson
Director, Palo Alto City Library
Forest Avenue
Palo Alto

Library system has many needs

Editor,

Palo Alto has a tradition of neighborhood branch libraries. The challenge is that there is not enough funding to support these branches and to provide even the most basic library services.

For example, the library just completed the modestly funded Teen Summer Reading Program. There is no library money for teen programs and services, so the Friends of the Palo Alto Library (FOPAL) funds it. FOPAL pays for it because the city does not.

The City Council has decided to maintain the five-branch system at this time. However, neighborhood branches are not the only need of this community. I witness daily a multitude of needs of library customers.

Parents and children come into Main Library daily looking for a children's collection but there is none. Students must visit two or three branches to obtain necessary materials. Members of the Teen Library Advisory Board express disappointment at not having the appropriate materials or space.

Customers become angry as they compete for limited technology and space. I see people seeking quiet study, group study, meeting space and even electrical outlets.

Money for the library is finite and continues to shrink. In "Library Outlook" (Weekly, Sept. 9), Mr. Sedriks referred to the director's move to a "grandiose showplace library." He writes about "showplaces" while the library pleads for materials, shelving, lighting, ventilation, equipment, space, seating, electric outlets and staff.

How do we fairly prioritize all community needs? The city has approved the financing of a comprehensive survey about the library to gather information about the priorities of all community members. Everyone should have the opportunity to voice his or her wishes, not just the most vocal or organized. This will create a roadmap for planning the future of the library.
Laurie Hastings
Senior Librarian, Palo Alto City Library
Tolman Drive
Stanford

Simpson's reference 'pejorative'

Editor,

I am disappointed that Paula Simpson, our Library Director, attempted to marginalize Palo Alto residents and their concerns by referring to them as "the Downtown Branch interest group" in her recent memo to the City Council

Traditionally an interest group is a term reserved for a heavily financed, politically connected lobby, usually working in the private interest. Unfortunately, it has become a common tactic, in vogue among cheesy politicians and talk-show hosts, to label in the pejorative anyone with whom you disagree as "an interest group" -- in this instance, library users and fundraisers.

In an attempt to dismiss and marginalize people, disrespect is sown.

We love our libraries. We can only resolve the current challenges to them if residents' ideas are respectfully considered, and in the end, their concerns satisfied.
Winter Dellenbach
Kingsley Avenue
Palo Alto

Cyclist could have used bridge

Editor,

We bike riders get blamed for everything. If it's not the collapse of Germany (Letters, Sept. 23), it's the slow disappearance of the Honoapiilani Highway into the sea along the west shore of Maui.

Why, just the other day I had a pineapple truck driver yell: "Hey brah, why you no surf?"

From his letter, Michael Goldeen (Sept. 28) obviously has inside information as to why Ms. Okuzumi was riding along Alma Street south of Charleston Road. Interestingly, if Ms. Okuzumi had continued across Charleston along Park Boulevard she would have come to Whitclem Drive that would have gotten her to Wilkie Way, where the bike bridge is in plain view.

If she was adventurous enough to find Park, locating the bike bridge should have been just as easy.
Mike Sowers
Pu'u Hale
Ka'anapali, Hawaii

'Ignoring facts' leads to 'fatigue'

Editor,

I confess to some sympathy with the Weekly's Sept. 21 editorial on the trails issue, specifically the "fatigue" part. I have not made an effort to follow the twists of this controversy because whenever I try I get overcome with glazed eyes and deep ennui.

So when I think about the matter, I tend to concentrate on the larger questions. On those, the Weekly's views seem consistently wrong.

First, Stanford's position has one important virtue: It has not changed since the university and the county entered into the current Land Use Agreement -- no surprises, no slippery maneuvers. Stanford said what it would do -- trail routes on its periphery and not through its interior -- the county agreed and Stanford's position is today what it was five years ago.

Only inattention, a bad memory, or a different agenda can lead to denial of that.

Second, a deal is a deal, or why make a deal? I would guess that the fatigue of the four-member majority of the supervisors comes in large part from their being forced to listen to Supervisor Liz Kniss and her allies pretend that what was plainly agreed to in 1995 doesn't exist or has no meaning -- "no longer operational," as they used to say in the Nixon days. I would think that the Weekly, too, would have found by now that the effort required to ignore facts really makes you weary.

Finally, it is an odd notion of property ownership that would let you take what I own just because you want it.
Robert M. Rosenzweig
Dana Avenue
Palo Alto

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