A proposed boost of thousands of dollars to E.S. Bird Library’s funding has school officials hoping the longstanding problems with Bird can be resolved.

Cramped quarters, carcinogens in Bird’s basement and challenges in keeping up with changing academic curricula have presented obstacles to updating the library.

But the budget for the 2012 fiscal year could provide approximately $900,000 to the library. About $400,000 of that would be funded on a recurring basis, increasing the base amount of money the library receives by $400,000. The other $500,000 would be a one-time allocation, said Pamela McLaughlin, director of communications and external relations at the library.

The budget still has to be finalized and passed by the Board of Trustees, but Tom Sherman, a member of University Senate’s Library Committee, said the board usually deviates little from the original budget.

To Sherman, the money provided to the library in the budget is far overdue.

‘The library has been chronically underfunded for 30 years, it’s not like this is a new problem,’ he said.

Bird currently has a shortfall of $4 million compared to other peer institutions, and while the additional $400,000 being proposed is a step in the right direction, it is only 10 percent of what SU needs to close the $4 million gap, Sherman said.

Once the budget is finalized, library officials will determine how to apply the funds, McLaughlin said. The specific areas the money will go toward are not yet known.

‘I don’t think we know because we haven’t planned on it being there,’ she said. ‘Once we know that the budget is solid, we’ll move ahead.’

The library has many areas that need financial support, McLaughlin said. Some of the areas the library will focus on if it receives the increased funding include staff salaries, new staff positions, additional collections, furnishing and renovations.

The library is currently facing a challenge in keeping up with academic fields that frequently change or are updated, such as forensics, McLaughlin said. If the library doesn’t have money, then it can’t support the changes in those areas, McLaughlin said.

‘We already don’t have the resources needed by faculty to conduct research in those areas,’ she said.

Paul Preczewski, president of the Graduate Student Organization and a member of USen, said graduate students need resources like electronic journals to work on their master’s thesis, dissertations and research.

‘The definition of library is changing a little bit in that it’s becoming much more computerized,’ he said.

Sherman, the member of USen’s Library Committee, also said the library should be able to support curricula that have changed over time. He cited drastic changes the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications has had to make to its curriculum in response to the journalism field moving in an online direction.

‘Those resources, if they’re not there, can really hurt the faculty,’ Sherman said.

The library has faced other challenges aside from adapting to changing curricula. Plans to renovate Bird’s basement stalled in 2009 after tests showed carpeting in the basement contained a carcinogen called polychlorinated biphenyls, or PCBs. This is still an issue that has yet to be resolved, McLaughlin said.

McLaughlin said the Environmental Health Office recently arranged for more testing, but didn’t have the results. The issue with the removal of the PCBs has been in the hands of other people in the university, she said.

‘The library very much wants to be able to move ahead with those renovations,’ she said. ‘We are following through as much as we possibly can.’

Some other problems in the library, such as the space issue for both students and books, are already in the process of being resolved.

There are plans to build a storage facility on South Campus, next to Hawkins Warehouse, that will store materials that aren’t often used in the library, McLaughlin said.

Students would be able to request these materials through the library catalogue and have them sent to Main Campus, McLaughlin said. There will also be a small reading room in the facility for people who need to use a number of materials stored there, she said.

Even though the facility will create shelf space in the library, it will be a difficult task to execute, said Sherman, the member of USen’s Library Committee.

‘Who decides on which books move, and how do you move 60,000 books and keep it in order?’ he said.

Shelving has also been added on the fourth and fifth floors of Bird to try and compensate for the lack of space, McLaughlin said. Tables were also moved to the lower level to make the library more spacious and useable, McLaughlin said.

Last year, the library looked into moving excess resources to an off-campus storage facility four hours away in Paterson, N.Y., due to the lack of space. But after much protest from students and faculty, SU called off those plans.

Even with the recent addition of space, some students still notice cramped quarters in the library.

‘I use it mainly to have an area where I’m not as distracted to do work, but sometimes there’s never enough space,’ said Mariel Stein, a senior psychology and policy studies major who uses the library three times a week if she has a significant amount of work.

If the renovations in Bird happen, McLaughlin said the library has the funding to build one or two classrooms in the basement, create a new layout and buy new furnishings.

But for now, the library will wait for the final budget to be passed.

snbouvia@syr.edu

Published on April 4, 2011 at 12:00 pm

Contact Stephanie: snbouvia@syr.edu | @snbouvia