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Library director offers steep cuts; foundation pledges to help keep book program afloat
Summary
The library representative proposed cutting multiple line items to reduce the library's levy request, agreed to a $20,000 book budget target and later to reduce to $5,000 with promised foundation fundraising; county staff agreed to absorb some cleaning costs from PILT.
Lincoln County officials and the library representative negotiated a series of line‑item reductions to reduce the library’s levy request. The library representative reported staffing ("We have four fulltime in Libby. We have one at .25 in Eureka and Troy") and said the educational supplies (book) budget was $24,000 with $23,395 spent last year.
During the session the library representative offered to rely on foundation fundraising for one budget cycle and said, "we are willing to drop our book budget down to $5,000." Officials agreed to a package of changes including cutting operating and recreational supplies, reducing communications/transport to $500, publicity/subscriptions to $18,000, and reducing repairs and maintenance (the cleaning contract) to $2,000 with the county proposing to absorb the remainder from PILT. The agreed reductions totaled approximately $36,365 to be entered into Black Mountain; staff will rerun levy sheets and return with final calculations. The session recorded no formal vote; changes were accepted by consensus and logged for follow up.
