Schillo to Ask Board to Back His Library Plan

Moving swiftly on his proposal to restructure the area’s library system, county Supervisor Frank Schillo will ask the Board of Supervisors on Tuesday to consider placing a special countywide homeowners’ tax on the November ballot to prop up cash-starved branches.

Along with the tax proposal, Schillo is seeking the board’s blessing for his plan to essentially transfer control of county-operated libraries to the cities where the branches are located.

Setting up a so-called joint powers authority made up of city and county officials would allow cities to run libraries more efficiently than the county does, Schillo says.

“There are going to be economies of scale that would not be available otherwise,” he said.

But library officials and supporters have long argued that the problem with libraries is not a lack of efficiency but of cash. State cuts in money to local governments have caused the annual budget of the county Library Services Agency to drop from about $10 million to about $6 million since 1992.

For this reason, library supporters welcomed Schillo’s proposal to set up a special countywide benefit assessment district that he hopes would raise up to $3 million for libraries under the new joint powers agreement.

“I think it is for sure that libraries need more money,” said Betty Sullivan, who worked on two unsuccessful March ballot measures that would have taxed Camarillo residents to raise money for their library. “People are going to have to bite the bullet and pay some more money.”

John Flynn, the only other supervisor who could be reached for comment, said he probably would back Schillo’s plan to restructure the library system. But he said he would try to find other ways to increase library revenues before putting a special tax on the ballot.

Schillo said he would ask the supervisors Tuesday to approve the hiring of an outside consultant at a cost of $50,000 to $100,000 to study the restructuring and tax district proposals.

The cities Schillo wants to include in the new library structure and countywide tax district include Ventura, Ojai, Port Hueneme, Camarillo, Simi Valley, Moorpark and Fillmore. Santa Paula, Oxnard and Thousand Oaks operate their own library systems, although Schillo said he would encourage them to become part of the proposed structure.

Schillo said it may be many weeks before supervisors would vote on such a tax plan, but he wants their approval to study setting up the special tax district.

Even if the supervisors approve the tax district, the levy would not go onto any city’s ballot without the permission of that city’s council.

Schillo said he did not know how much homeowners would be asked to pay, but that the tax could be similar to recent library ballot measures that asked residents to provide $25 to $35 annually.

Recent parcel tax measures failed at the ballot box in Ventura and Camarillo--a fact that many attributed to a requirement that the initiatives win 66.7% of the vote.

Under Schillo’s plan, if cities decide to become part of the countywide tax district, the measure could pass on the November ballot with 50% of the vote, as long as no more than 25% of affected property owners protested the plan, he said.

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If more than a quarter of the homeowners raised objections to the plan in a formal protest, the special tax district would then need a two-thirds voter majority to pass, Schillo said.

Schillo said the tax district would stand a better chance of passing than recent ballot initiatives because many fell short of 66.7% of the vote, but cleared the 50% voter-approval mark.

“Some city councils may say they don’t want to do this,” Schillo said. “Well, they will have to come up with their own funds for their libraries. That’s why if we are all in the joint powers authority, we are all working toward getting the funding.”

Ventura County taxpayer advocates were not available for comment late Wednesday, but have said they object to asking voters to pay more for libraries, since most of the existing library agency’s budget now comes from property tax revenues earmarked for libraries.

Taxpayer advocates have said that local governments should take money from other city and county programs to help bail out libraries.

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Schillo said that cities would have an escape clause if they entered the joint powers agreement but later had second thoughts.

“There is some wiggle room in here,” Schillo said. “If the consultant comes back with a totally different picture or identifies a fatal flaw, they would have the opportunity to get out of the joint powers authority.”

Schillo’s proposal comes as the library agency faces the probability of a $1.6 million loss in revenues in the next year. In response, the agency last week drafted three scenarios to keep it afloat, including a plan to shut down six small libraries across Ventura County and one large library in Ventura.

Dixie Adeniran, director of the agency, is also set to go before the board Tuesday with a plan to eliminate three agency positions, saving about $211,000 annually. Since 1992, the number of agency employees has dropped from 133 to 77 because of the budget crisis.

Schillo said his restructuring and special tax district “would bring the libraries back to the place where they were before the state took the money away. You would be able to open quite a few more hours and buy the books that we have not bought in the past.”

Ventura City Councilman Jim Friedman said Schillo still has a lot of ground to cover in his proposal, including convincing cities that the plan would work.

“I am open-minded about looking into the pros and cons,” Friedman said. “But cities still have to sign on.”

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Ventura’s Community Affairs Commission voted Wednesday to adopt recommendations, prepared by a special library task force, that urge Ventura’s city manager to continue studying the joint-powers concept.

The seven-member, City Council-appointed commission also adopted a recommendation that calls on the council to help keep Ventura’s three branches open by providing up to $400,000 annually in general fund money.

Potential cuts to the county’s library agency could force county-operated libraries in Ventura to scale back hours from the current 76 to 23.

The Community Affairs Commission is set to present its recommendations to the City Council on May 13, including one proposal that calls for a citywide study on the library problem.