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Town of Chapel Hill Official VVebsite -Comments of Mayor Foy to Orange County Board Page 1 of 2 Calendar Directory Documents Open Jobs Bid Notices Print Page ~ Email Page Home > Newsroom > News Releases > 2008 News > Comments of Mayor Foy to Orange County Board Comments of Mayor Foy to the Orange County Board of Commissioners - ]une 3, 2008 06/03/08 -Chairman Jacobs and members of the Board of Commissioners; Madam Manager; Mr. Attorney. I appreciate your giving me an opportunity to speak before you this evening. I am here on behalf of the Chapel Hill Town Council. Like you, we are in the midst of our budget considerations; and like you, we find ourselves confronted with difficult choices in a year of increasing health care costs, increasing energy costs, and other pressures. But I want to speak with you tonight only tangentially about the budget. My real focus this evening is on growth -the cost of growth as it relates to one part of our community. And in that regard, I want to speak with you about providing library services in Orange County. As you know, the Chapel Hill library, whose operations have long been funded in part by a contribution from the Board of Commissioners, is growing. You know that the demand for libraries throughout Orange County is growing - in fact Orange County is building a new library in Hillsborough and considering building a new library in the southern part of the county. The continuing growth in demand at the Chapel Hill library has prompted the Town Council to begin construction this year on a $16 million expansion, which will significantly increase the physical size of the library and its ability to serve Orange County citizens. The Chapel Hill library is one of the most heavily used in the state, and it consistently gets high marks for quality of service. But one thing I draw to your attention is this fact: the Chapel Hill library currently serves a significant number of patrons who live in Orange County but not in Chapel Hill. In fact, our data indicates that almost 40% of the library's patrons are Orange County residents who live outside Chapel Hill. These patrons borrowed almost 350,000 items last year. The reason that I bring this up is because the county's contribution to library operations (which is the contribution on behalf of these patrons) is approximately 11%; this discrepancy between patron usage at 40% and patron funding at 11% is not sustainable for the town. That's why we are seeking an increase in county support. I think this funding discrepancy is an anomaly, because 20 years ago, the county's share of funding for the library was 20% of operating costs. That httpa/www.townofchapelhill.org/index.asp?NID=1729 3/25/2009 Home ~ Government ~ Departments ~ Services ~ Enjoy Our Town ~ News Releases