ILA @ALA

Hello--

State Library Council member Tom Martin, ILA President Barbara Peterson, State Librarian Mary Wegner, and I, ILA GAC Chairman Mike Dargan, spent the early part of last week participating in ALA Legislative Day activities. I've posted a few pictures of our visit to a Flickr site and invite you to view and "tag" them. (I'm a recent immigrant to Flickr; after about two years of Picasaweb I've been advised that I'm on an evolutionary dead end!)

ALA Legislative Day activities started at 9:00 a.m May 13 with a briefing in the Liaison Capitol Hill Hotel banquet room. During a break we met with Senator Harkin's staff person, Adrienne Hallet, who advised us on the technical aspects and status of funding for LSTA programs as well as the need for library language in a school facility upgrade bill. Armed with this imformation, we then proceeded (on foot!) to the Longworth House office building where we met with a staff person (April?) for Representative Boswell, who took notes while we expressed our support for full LSTA funding and other issues.

Over the next day and a half we repeated the process with Rob Goldsmith (Representative Bruce Braley), Senator Charles Grassley, Representative Dave Loebsack, Senator Tom Harkin (at the weekly Iowa Breakfast), a staff person for Representative Steve King, and finally, staff person Aaron Burnett (Representative Latham).

As you might expect, everyone was attentive when we expressed our pro-library sentiments and responded positively. However, probably wisely, no one made any promises. The commonest observation was that this is a highly partisan year and that the next budget will likely be determined by a Continuing Resolution. If so, it's likely that LSTA funding will be flat for FY2009.

What's the upshot? For FY2009, President Bush has proposed funding LSTA at $171,500,000. A Continuing Resolution would maintain (maybe!) funding at the FY2008 level: $160,900,000. Full funding would result in larger allocations to state libraries. However, my prediction is that the budget logjam will not be broken, we'll be stuck with FY2008 funding, and we'll have to hope that the next President and Congress can get along, that they will be library supporters, and that they'll have the money available to spend on LSTA funding. (The war in Iraq is having a major impact on the budget.)

Our lobbying focused largely on LSTA funding. However, we also expressed interest on improved broadband Internet, especially in rural areas, as well as language ensuring that school libraries would be included in legislation intended to upgrade school facilities.

We weren't able to meet with every elected official, but we at least got to visit with senior staff members--which may be more important in the long-run. So, I judge this trip to have been a worthwhile effort. None of this would have been accomplished with out the leadership of State Librarian Mary Wegner and ILA President Barbara Peterson. I thank them and the Iowa Library Association for the opportunity to promote library services in our nation's capital!

If you have any questions, comments, corrections, and/or suggestions, please contact me at MikeDargan@iowalibraryassociation.org.

I look forward to seeing all of you at ILA 2008!