Library leaders press council for Brooklyn Park renovation, new Mountain Road site and a data-analyst position

Skip Al, chief executive officer of the Anne Arundel County Public Library system, thanked the council for recent support and asked the council to approve two capital projects and several operating positions in the FY27 proposal. He identified a $4.7 million renovation for the Brooklyn Park branch and requested a feasibility study and future funding for a new Mountain Road Library site.

Skip Al said the system has high usage: about 321,209 library cardholders countywide and nearly 200,000 cardholders used their accounts in the past year. He argued the library operates efficiently on relatively low per-capita funding compared with peer suburban Maryland systems and cited the value of state service programs that provide workers at low or no direct cost to the county.

Library staff and partners supplemented the request: August Wickman, a data analyst, described how a performance-measures and data-analyst position supports library operations and many county services (food access, public-health responses and voter services) and urged funding to retain the position after a Maryland Service Corps contract ends. The speakers asked the council to include the requested maintenance mechanic and the performance-measures/data analyst in the operating budget to sustain service delivery as the library moves to a new headquarters and opens planned facilities.

The council did not vote that night; the requests will be considered as part of the budget deliberation process.