Letters

Comments (0) Wednesday, May 1 1996

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Free the Main
In 1994, voters passed Proposition E to fund more books and longer hours throughout the library system. Before implementing the voters' mandate, the San Francisco Public Library commissioned a survey that showed that two-thirds of the respondents need the library open until at least 9 p.m. And, they said, weekend hours were just as important as late evening hours. Steve Coulter may be bluffing your reporter ("Whose Library Is It?" Bay View, April 17) when he says, "If the library users say they want longer evening hours, that's what they'll get."

What library users now have is a Main Library open until 8 p.m. three evenings a week. Those short hours seem to have been established so that legitimate library use would not interfere with the Library Foundation's partying. The taxpayers have been swindled. No voter in this town agreed to spend $104.5 million to build a palatial party site. Whenever the library building is open, it must be open to readers.

With the passage of Prop. E, the SFPL became one of the most generously funded libraries in the country. We do not need any supplemental funding -- from the supervisors, from the foundation, or from corporate San Francisco. What we do need is a city librarian who is not a wastrel and a Library Commission president who is not deaf, dumb, and blind to the public's needs and the public interest.

Lee Gertler
Sea Cliff

Correction
The April 24 Portfolio misidentified the photographer. He is Justin Sullivan.