Roseburg City library reports steady usage, highlights staffing limits and digital strategy

Director Chris Wiley presented Roseburg City’s 2023–24 annual library statistics and a strategic-plan update at the commission’s meeting, saying the library serves a population of 24,258 and that volunteers and a small paid staff sustain most services.

Citing state-compiled comparisons with 24 similarly sized Oregon libraries, Wiley said Roseburg’s paid staff “is small and mighty,” reporting eight paid staff positions (including part-time posts and 10-hour positions) and about 1,200 volunteer hours. He told the commission the library was open about 34 hours per week during the fiscal year, compared with an average of about 49 hours among peer libraries.

The statistics matter because lower staff and service hours affect circulation and programs, Wiley and staff said. “We add about 4,000 items every year” to a collection of roughly 80,000 physical items, Wiley said, and the library checked out about 78,000 physical items in the year measured. Per-capita first-time circulation was 4.55, below the peer average of 5.88, and the library reported adding about 1,800 new cardholders last year.

Wiley highlighted youth services as a strength. The library checked out about 39,000 children’s items (close to peer averages) and exceeded peers in young-adult material circulation. He credited “Aurora” (the services librarian) and outreach such as school visits and partnerships with the Boys & Girls Club for those numbers.

Staff described the library’s digital holdings and plans to reduce hold queues on high-demand e-titles. The library participates in the Oregon Digital Library Consortium and holds about 100,000 digital items; staff added nearly 12,000 digital items last year. Wiley described strategies to “buy out” long hold queues on popular titles by licensing additional simultaneous-use copies when budgets allow, and said the library will invest more in digital licenses over the next year or two.

On funding, staff said total revenue for the library’s operations was about $800,000, mostly from local government, with other income from donations and grants (examples cited include Ready to Read funds and one-time federal or foundation grants). Expenses reported were roughly $690,000; staff said print-material expenditures were about $60,000 and other subscriptions about $23,000. The commission was told the library intends to apply for a $15,000 grant from the CJ Hussey Hunt Charitable Trust (listed in meeting materials as due at month’s end) to buy digital and physical materials.

Wiley and staff reviewed elements of the library’s strategic plan (created in 2020), saying it will be updated with outside consulting help and that some objectives have been deferred because of limited staffing. Outreach efforts (homebound delivery, craft-kit distribution, school visits) continue but are constrained by staff capacity. Staff noted they paused some Spanish-language programming because community outreach patterns changed and that the library now schedules homebound deliveries twice monthly due to demand.

Commissioners and staff discussed funding options and long-range staffing. Nikki (identified in the meeting as a city official) was described as the city contact for higher-level revenue and budget conversations; staff said ongoing operational staffing increases would require broader city-level budget decisions and not typically come from one-off grants. Staff said AmeriCorps positions have been used previously for project work but are temporary and project-specific.

Votes at a glance: The commission approved the minutes from its previous meeting by voice vote; no recorded names were provided for the mover or seconder. The chair called for “aye”; none opposed.

The meeting packet and the full strategic-plan document are posted on the library’s website, and staff invited commissioners to request additional statistics or future presentations on specific topics such as the digital-collection strategy or long-range funding options.