Comments on: County Plans To Withhold Library Funding From City To Benefit Rural Branches

By: PSU1Earl

PSU1Earl — Wed, 10 Oct 2012 12:50:17 +0000

Trish, got it right… I live in the Molino area and my family uses Tryton, but will be using Molino… The city library numbers are skewed because they are the only other choice… with the limited hour Tryton may be still my only option because of work hours… the crazy thing is them cutting the book purchases by 85%… What do they think is suppose to be in a library? Homeless people? ha ha…

By: Melanie

Melanie — Wed, 10 Oct 2012 11:55:29 +0000

As a Century resident, we need and use our public library full-time. Thanks to Mr. Oliver for your support and to William for the editorial. Anyone know when the next county commisioner meeting is and is there a public forum?

By: M & M

M & M — Wed, 10 Oct 2012 01:26:54 +0000

We know the city pays taxes to the city. Thats what you do when you are a city.
Better check all the facts. Most of the county buildings are located in Pensacola
since it is the county seat. Alot of county money goes into Pensacola, so what is wrong with a little falling back to the rural areas? If we have jury duty what do we
do that live outside of Pensacola? We drive to the far end of a county that is 50 miles long. We don’t gripe about that because we choose to live outside the city.
In case some donot know Molino was once an incorporated town and Century is still. We have worked for years to get a library for this area. It is like a slap in the face to get so close and be denied. Sorry, we are so much of a problem and desire to have oppourtnities for our children, grandchildren, neighbors and all the citizenery of this county no matter where they live.

By: MolinoLady

MolinoLady — Tue, 09 Oct 2012 17:14:52 +0000

A good example of consolidation in our government in the libraries!!! There you go. Sometimes it does work but when there is a disagreement it does not work at all. Same with the federal government. It is the ‘boss’ dictates who ‘needs’ what – when he is wrong there is trouble.
Everywhere I look in this scheme it appears the city gets more votes (it is only one district) than the other four districts. It actually is not exactly a ‘district’ but that is how it all adds up by population.

By: Trish

Trish — Tue, 09 Oct 2012 15:23:08 +0000

To Bradley:

We all know that the city is in the county. There is a lot going on that the general public is unaware of. However to deny that the small libraries in the outlying areas of the county are always short changed is ludicrious. We could always examine the fact that at least half of the daily users at the downtown library are the homeless looking for an a/c area for the summer and a heated area to spend time in the winter. Take that number “of users” out of the equation and lets see where downtown stands. I am not saying that the homeless are less important than other patrons but the fact that they come to the main library everyday to utilitze the building for comfort instead of the using resources should be considered instead of just using the number of people that walk through the door then saying “look how many people use our facility”.

You also have to take into account that a lot of people who use outlying branches also use city branches. Does that make the county branches less important? With this horrible ecconomy I call it being smart to plan your trips and combine areas you want to go to in order to save on gasoline. By cutting outlying branches then of course a committed library user will go to a city facility that is open more hours therefore increasing that libraries numbers of users which in turn “justifies” their being open more hours. Sounds like a visious cycle to me.

By: HopeThisWorks

HopeThisWorks — Tue, 09 Oct 2012 14:49:29 +0000

I hope this move works and doesn’t become a shoving contest between city and county.

William, THANK YOU for bringing this issue to our attention! Your vigilance has served us well.

By: dw

dw — Tue, 09 Oct 2012 14:23:50 +0000

JJ Johnson
I don’t know if your comments were rhetorical or frustration or both. In reality those who live within any cities incorporated area due indeed pay tax for services that are county wide. The reason is one of structure. Areas of a county become a city when such area incorporates. That decision translates into the city paying more for what they want. Escambia/pensacolal could solve this conundrum through consolidation
(VERY different that Charter). Only citizens can cause this action, not ‘da gubment’
Then tax cost is reduced.

By: JJ Johnson

JJ Johnson — Tue, 09 Oct 2012 13:43:04 +0000

Can Pensacola secede from Escambia County and keep the $18,000,000 in property taxes the county spends outside the city?

Can Pensacola become an independent city and keep all the local share in sales tax collected inside the city? After all, well over half the sales tax collected in Escambia County is collectd in Pensacola, but the county government gets to spend 83% of it on capital projects, all outside the city.

The answer to both of course is no. Too bad.

By: Bradley

Bradley — Tue, 09 Oct 2012 13:38:33 +0000

All of the branches are in the county, including the ones in the city limits. City residents pay twice. The hours were reduced at all branches, probably based on usage. If the County wants the brand new branch at Molino fully staffed, they should fully fund the library instead of putting the money in reserve.

By: Jane

Jane — Tue, 09 Oct 2012 12:31:10 +0000

Thanks to William for this and to Randy Oliver for his attention to this matter! It is about time the north end got some of the tax money we put into the system directed into this area!!!