KY Governor’s Budget Would Eliminate Library Funds; Library Journal, February 7, 2018

Bob Warburton, Library Journal; KY Governor’s Budget Would Eliminate Library Funds

"DEPENDENT ON STATE AID

State law KRS 171.201 provides for a Public Library Services Improvement and Equalization Fund and uses a formula to determine how much county library systems can receive.

To begin with, each library system gets a lump sum grant: $9,000 for counties with a population of 22,000 or fewer, $8,000 for counties with a population between 22,001 and 45,000, and $7,000 for counties with more than 45,000 residents. The remaining aid is doled out at a rate of 73 cents per capita, to be used for a wide variety of purposes at the discretion of each library system.

The 2018–20 Executive Budget Recommendation posted online includes this notation: “Notwithstanding KRS 171.201, the Executive Budget provides no funding for non-construction state aid to local libraries.”

The vast majority of Kentucky libraries rely on tax revenue to fund the bulk of their operations. State aid is usually a smaller, but not insignificant, piece of their budget, Adler said. But for the 20 or so small county systems that aren’t part of a library taxing district, state aid is the only thing between them and serious financial hardship."