Contra Costa Library turns 100!

For information on various 100th year celebrations happening all over the CCC Library system check out http://guides.ccclib.org/100thbirthday.

One City, One Book

Thanks to the participation of  Lamorinda (Lafayette, Moraga, and Orinda) in the "One City, One Book" program Dave Eggers will speaking at Veteran's Memorial Building on February 28th of 2013 (mark your calendars!).  Lamorinda's book choice is Eggers' new book Hologram for the King. (Which, if you've seen it, takes hardback book to a whole other level. I think it's the world's first bullet proof book.)

I had a chance to see Eggers speak a couple years back and cannot recommend more that you go see him (tickets are free!). My only recommendation is that you read the book before you see him speak. Last time I saw him speak he kind-of gave away the ending to Zeitoun before I a chance to read it :(

In case you were wondering, Pleasant Hill has not revealed what the 2013 One City,  One Book choice will be yet. The 2012 pick is The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien. Unfortunately, I don't think he'll be speaking anywhere anytime soon.

High Praise For Our Libraries!

via the CCC Library Facebook page

Contra Costa County Library Awarded 2012 National Medal for Museum and Library Service

 

WASHINGTON — (November 5, 2012) – The Institute of Museum and Library Services today announced Contra Costa County Library as one of 10 recipients of this year's National Medal for Museum and Library Service. The nation's highest honor conferred on museums and libraries for service to the community, the National Medal celebrates institutions that make a difference for individuals, families and communities.  The National Medal will be presented at a celebration in Washington, D.C. on November 14.

Contra Costa County Library is reshaping how residents access library services on the go. Snap & Go, a smart phone application, uses QR codes to give the Library a deeper reach into the community, putting library resources like ebooks and text-reference, literally, into the hands of commuters on buses and in transit stations. Library-a-Go-Go book lending machines bring library service to the people both in underserved locations and in spaces where people gather, like shopping malls. And Discover & Go, their latest innovation, allows libraries throughout Northern California to offer their cardholders access to downloadable free passes to local museums and a wide range of cultural institutions.  By making this service available to other libraries, Contra Costa County Library is changing the way libraries do business with each other and helping library cardholders throughout the region be aware of and gain access to local culture.

for more: https://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=10151247223612668

2012 Annual Book Giveaway!

The World's greatest book giveaway (that I know of) is coming again this August 16th through August 31st from 9am-5pm! Located in the loaded docks of the Pleasant Hill Library, there will be thousands of free books to pick-up!

In years past I have left with literally HUNDREDS of books! I assume the best pickings are early, but I usually go toward the end and still find great picks. If you are also a teacher, this is a great way to built a solid classroom library.

Details:
75 Santa Barbara Road
Pleasant Hill, CA 94523

Books will be sorted into the following sections:
Children’s Fiction
Children's Non-fiction
Adult Fiction
Adult Non-Fiction
Paperbacks
Hardcover books in all subjects

Please bring your own boxes or bags

CCC Library Summer Reading Festival 2011

The Contra Costa Library Summer Reading Festival is back this year with a slew of events for people of all ages. The headliner this year is travel author Rick Steves. Though in, in my opinion, this seems like a huge drop off in headliners from last year (Dave Eggers), Steves is an incredibly accomplished author with a very large following. I have personally never read his work, if anyone has, and can explain how he differs from any "Let's Go" travel guide please leave a comment.

Other than Steves, the line-up of events look to be a lot of fun. My favorite part of these summer programs is having my kids complete the reading list and other reading/literacy activities. When they finish, their names go up on the library wall and each gets a free new book!

Here are some links:

Programs/Events:
http://guides.ccclib.org/content.php?pid=194227&sid=1670925

Kid's reading list:
http://guides.ccclib.org/content.php?pid=194227&sid=1627893

Teen's reading list:
http://guides.ccclib.org/content.php?pid=194227&sid=1627894

Adult's reading list:
http://guides.ccclib.org/content.php?pid=194227&sid=1668135

From the New York Times

The New York Times

September 26, 2010
Anger as a Private Company Takes Over Libraries
By DAVID STREITFELD

SANTA CLARITA, Calif. — A private company in Maryland has taken over public libraries in ailing cities in California, Oregon, Tennessee and Texas, growing into the country’s fifth-largest library system.

Now the company, Library Systems & Services, has been hired for the first time to run a system in a relatively healthy city, setting off an intense and often acrimonious debate about the role of outsourcing in a ravaged economy.

A $4 million deal to run the three libraries here is a chance for the company to demonstrate that a dose of private management can be good for communities, whatever their financial situation. But in an era when outsourcing is most often an act of budget desperation — with janitors, police forces and even entire city halls farmed out in one town or another — the contract in Santa Clarita has touched a deep nerve and begun a round of second-guessing.

Can a municipal service like a library hold so central a place that it should be entrusted to a profit-driven contractor only as a last resort — and maybe not even then?

“There’s this American flag, apple pie thing about libraries,” said Frank A. Pezzanite, the outsourcing company’s chief executive. He has pledged to save $1 million a year in Santa Clarita, mainly by cutting overhead and replacing unionized employees. “Somehow they have been put in the category of a sacred organization.”

The company, known as L.S.S.I., runs 14 library systems operating 63 locations. Its basic pitch to cities is that it fixes broken libraries — more often than not by cleaning house.

“A lot of libraries are atrocious,” Mr. Pezzanite said. “Their policies are all about job security. That’s why the profession is nervous about us. You can go to a library for 35 years and never have to do anything and then have your retirement. We’re not running our company that way. You come to us, you’re going to have to work.”

The members of the Santa Clarita City Council who voted to hire L.S.S.I. acknowledge there was no immediate threat to the libraries. The council members say they want to ensure the libraries’ long-term survival in a state with increasingly shaky finances.

Until now, the three branch locations have been part of the Los Angeles County library system. Under the new contract, the branches will be withdrawn from county control and all operations — including hiring staff and buying books — ceded to L.S.S.I.

“The libraries are still going to be public libraries,” said the mayor pro tem, Marsha McLean. “When people say we’re privatizing libraries, that is just not a true statement, period.”

Library employees are furious about the contract. But the reaction has been mostly led by patrons who say they cannot imagine Santa Clarita with libraries run for profit.

“A library is the heart of the community,” said one opponent, Jane Hanson. “I’m in favor of private enterprise, but I can’t feel comfortable with what the city is doing here.”

Mrs. Hanson and her husband, Tom, go to their local branch every week or two to pick up tapes for the car and books to read after dinner. Mrs. Hanson recently checked out Willa Cather’s classic “Death Comes for the Archbishop,” although she was only mildly in favor of its episodic style; she has higher hopes for her current choice, on the shadowy world of North Korea.

The suggestion that a library is different — and somehow off limits to the outsourcing fever — has been echoed wherever L.S.S.I. has gone. The head of the county library system, Margaret Donnellan Todd, says L.S.S.I. is viewed as an unwelcome outsider.

“There is no local connection,” she said. “People are receiving superb service in Santa Clarita. I challenge that L.S.S.I. will be able to do much better.”

As a recent afternoon shaded into evening, there were more than a hundred patrons at the main Santa Clarita library. Students were doing their homework. Old men paged through newspapers. Children gathered up arm’s loads of picture books. It was a portrait of civic harmony and engagement.

Mrs. Hanson, who is 81 and has been a library patron for nearly 50 years, was so bothered by the outsourcing contract that she became involved in local politics for the first time since 1969, when she worked for a recall movement related to the Vietnam War.

She drew up a petition warning that the L.S.S.I. contract would result in “greater cost, fewer books and less access,” with “no benefit to the citizens.” Using a card table in front of the main library branch, she gathered 1,200 signatures in three weekends.

L.S.S.I. says none of Mrs. Hanson’s fears are warranted, but the anti-outsourcing forces continue to air their suspicions at private meetings and public forums, even wondering whether a recall election is feasible.

“Public libraries invoke images of our freedom to learn, a cornerstone of our democracy,” Deanna Hanashiro, a retired teacher, said at the most recent city council meeting.

Frank Ferry, a Santa Clarita councilman, dismisses the criticism as the work of the Service Employees International Union, which has 87 members in the libraries. The union has been distributing red shirts defending the status quo. “Union members out in red shirts in defense of union jobs,” Mr. Ferry said.

Library employees are often the most resistant to his company, said Mr. Pezzanite, a co-founder of L.S.S.I. — and, he suggested, for reasons that only reinforce the need for a new approach.

“Pensions crushed General Motors, and it is crushing the governments in California,” he said. While the company says it rehires many of the municipal librarians, they must be content with a 401(k) retirement fund and no pension.

L.S.S.I. got its start 30 years ago developing software for government use, then expanded into running libraries for federal agencies. In the mid-1990s, it moved into the municipal library market, and now, when ranked by number of branches, it places immediately after Los Angeles County, New York City, Chicago and the City of Los Angeles.

The company is majority owned by Islington Capital Partners, a private equity firm in Boston, and has about $35 million in annual revenue and 800 employees. Officials would not discuss the company’s profitability.

Some L.S.S.I. customers have ended their contracts, while in other places, opposition has faded with time. In Redding, Calif., Jim Ceragioli, a board member of the Friends of Shasta County Library, said he initially counted himself among the skeptics.

But he has since changed his mind. “I can’t think of anything that’s been lost,” Mr. Ceragioli said.

The library in Redding has expanded its services and hours. And the volunteers are still showing up — even if their assistance is now aiding a private company. “We volunteer more than ever now,” Mr. Ceragioli said.

Dave Eggers Coming to Walnut Creek

The brilliant young writer Dave Eggers (What is the What, Away We Go, A Heart Breaking Work of Staggering Genius) is coming to Walnut Creek as part of the CCC Library's Summer Reading Festival.

Tickets to see him and for the book signing are free (though with processing fees etc. its $1.50 per ticket).

You can get them here: http://purchase.tickets.com/buy/TicketPurchase?orgid=23939&event_val=LBRY

More info on the Summer Reading Festival:
http://guides.ccclib.org/SRF