Don't close the book on our libraries

I applaud the recent school board work that has kept both our school counselors and our school librarians in our school budget for at least another year as we struggle with the recent budget crisis.

As a concerned parent, I sat in on one school board meeting that discussed what was at stake and was dismayed to discover that the crisis had the board facing the choice of either cutting counselors or librarians. As if one could be deemed more important then the other. Luckily, this choice did not have to be made. We are keeping both for now.

For future thought, the back up for our school's loss of librarians is to turn to using our great community libraries. This will not be true if we do not act now.

Our community libraries are facing Prop 1A borrowing, which will allow Sacramento to take our community money for their budgetary needs. If this happens, our local libraries will be forced to drastically reduce hours, services and books.

Please contact the governor's office at (916) 4452841, Assembly Speaker Karen Bass at (916) 319-2047 and Senate President Pro Tem Don Perata at (916) 651-4009. Insist that community money stay in the community the money comes from to pay for services it was originally collected to fund. This is very important—your library is in danger.

In the past when Prop 1A borrowing undermined our library, we had to sue to get community money returned to community use. We do not need to experience this travesty again. Please act today. Mary T. Ficalora Agoura Hills