Libraries and communities

My local library is under threat a closure, due to the cuts that need to be made in the council's budget.  Strangely, I don't feel overly fussed about this.  Yes, I have been using the library system a lot more of late - I get my reading fix without damaging my bank balance too much and without having to think of ever more ingenious storage solution - but while it will be a bit of a faff having to go into town on a Saturday to use the main branch if I don't manage to get out to the library at lunch time in the week it doesn't bother me too much that the local branch might close.

I was in there this morning, changing the two books I read last weekend for three others.  These are books I possibly wouldn't buy so it's expanding my reading in that sense, but the same would be the case in the main library.  It's a nice enough building, I'm not sure how old but probably one of the newer ones.  While I was there, though, I heard the staff loudly talking about an incident last night with trouble from local youths, learned that at the job interview for that particular branch a large part of the questions were not to do with knowledge of library duties but centred on how a candidate would deal with youths causing trouble, and was one of only two people in the half hour I was browsing who was actually looking at borrowing books.  There were three or four people using the computers, something which could be set up at the community centre round the corner if need be.  And that was it.  Maybe there is a rush later in the day, I don't know.  But given that this is a Saturday when one would expect it to be busier because fewer people would be at work, and that the library is meant to be a vital community resource, it doesn't seem to me that there is really much call for it in this community.

I realise that what I see is only a very small snapshot of the life of the local branch in the course of its week.  Still, it does seem rather a waste of resources. 

The council is giving local communities the opportunity to run their branches with volunteers.  Apparently there has already been interest expressed in doing so for some of the branches at risk.  Don't know if that applies for mine.  Community groups would get the building for a peppercorn rent, the council saves money on staffing costs.  I realise it is not going to be easy for communities to do, but if they really value the resource and enough people actually make use of it then it strikes me as a reasonable option.  The real downside with libraries like mine is dealing with the trouble such as I heard being described, which is a bit rough for volunteers to have to cope with.  And yet that comes down to the problems with the nature of the community - is it any fairer for people employed to work in libraries to have to put up with that?