Opinion: Shelve the state library move

With even Republican lawmakers adding their voices to the public's protests, Gov. Jeb Bush saw how poorly his bean counters had served him with their plot to close the state library. But the fallback plan revealed Tuesday is scarcely better and should be just as unwelcome in the Legislature.

The new version calls for shipping the capital library's entire circulating collection, some 680,000 books, microfiche cards and other items, to Nova Southeastern University, a private institution at Fort Lauderdale, which promises to make them as available to the public as they have been in Tallahassee. Citing the vastly larger population in southeast Florida, the administration argues that many more people will be utilizing the resource.

One trouble with that excuse is that the state library is not just about lending books to the public; it is an information resource for state government, and many of its specialized acquisitions were made with that purpose in mind. Though it seems at times as if Bush intends otherwise, Tallahassee is still a state capital; government researchers shouldn't have to send nearly 500 miles for what is now across the street.

As for accessibility to population centers, there are four public universities -- Central Florida, South Florida, Florida Atlantic and Florida International -- that are as well-situated as the private school Bush intends to gift with a $10-million collection and $5-million, over four years, for shipping and management. Were any of the state universities offered the collection on comparably generous terms? Apparently not. Again, a rationalization: The universities don't have the space and don't allow public borrowers. Both points could have been overcome, of course, with the money that Bush is willing to lavish on Nova.

Space and public access weren't a problem to the administration when its first thought was to ship the entire library down the street to Florida State University, but with no money to house or staff it. FSU president T.K. Wetherell, facing an $18-million cut in Bush's proposed budget, prudently declined. At that point, the governor should have seen the light and dropped the entire shaky scheme. It seems, however, that his obsession to continue eliminating state jobs dovetailed neatly with Nova's need to fill a new library building.

Ironically, one of the state library administrators who has been pink-slipped won a Davis Productivity Award last year for an innovation that saves the state $3-million a year. What a fine example her dismissal will set.

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