The-Ave.US

A new craze is sweeping America: Kinder, gentler libraries. They’re experimenting with abolishing fines.

Does it even matter, with libraries closed for the foreseeable future? Yes it does! Unless you’re convinced we’ll never recover from Covid-19 and can’t bring yourself to believe they won’t reopen someday.

This is bound to be controversial. After all, everything else is; it’s unAmerican to not be disputatious. And punitive.

Late-return fines are one of the few ways libraries can get patrons to return books on time (or at all), in a country where personal responsibility isn’t what it used to be (can’t even get people to wear masks to save their own lives, etc.); and easing up on punishment (for whatever) can only promote Somalia-like anarchy and Venezuelan socialism (at the same time).

Never mind that people who devote their lives to library management, and have thought long and hard about this issue, backed by research findings, concluded that abolishing library fines not only is workable, but may even work better. Experts are not to be trusted. So, why even think about it, much less talk about it?

Because thinking, and then discussing, is what rational people do? — they’re not to be trusted, either! So, dear readers, what follows is subversive, and is posted here solely for the purpose of advocating the overthrow of the existing order.

The Atlantic, in an article here, explains the rationale:

“Collecting fines for overdue books has been going on for over a century, originally seen as a source of revenue and as an incentive for people to behave responsibly and actually return borrowed books. Then, as early as the 1970s, research and experiments with going fine-free began to pick up steam … [and] many librarians have begun to question the traditional policy of overdue fines …. Are fines consistent with a fundamental mission of libraries: to serve the public with information and knowledge? And to address that mission equitably across the diverse population of rich and poor library users?

“A 2016 Colorado State Library system report showed that eliminating overdue fines removed barriers to access for children.  … In 2018, a poll of Urban Libraries Council (ULC) member libraries found that the most common reason … libraries had gone fine-free was that eliminating fines increased access for low-income users and children. …

“When the pandemic closed libraries and made it hard or impossible for people to return books, many libraries revisited their policies on overdue fines. … Some stopped fining all patrons; others only children or youth; still others exempted active military and veterans from fines. Some forgive fines up to a certain dollar amount … one common practice [is] forgiving fines for a certain number of days … then charging for the cost of the book, which can be forgiven upon its return.”

Writing off fines also pays off in terms of returned books:

“When libraries offer … amnesty … for returning overdue books, the books often pour in like gushers. An amnesty program in Chicago brought in 20,000 overdue items; Los Angeles nearly 65,000; San Francisco just shy of  700,000.”

(What’s with people in San Francisco? Why is book stealing so much higher there?)

Studies found that libraries which eliminated fines experienced “increased goodwill” between users and staff, increases in users and circulation, and no increases in late book returns. Public libraries, which we support with our taxes, “are in business to be responsive to public needs and wants.” They provide access to reading material for people who can’t buy everything they read, which is most people, and eliminating fines removes a barrier to accessing that service and furthers the mission of libraries.

So, that is why libraries are getting rid of traditional fine policies. In case you were wondering. Finally, no article on this topic would be complete without posting Seinfeld Library Cop:

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