Library system among best

Here’s a piece of news you can file away under the letter “E” for “expected.” Newport Beach’s library system is the best in its class in the state.

Now, that this bit of news isn’t exactly shocking (that would have been put in stacks with the other “Ss,” of course) doesn’t take the shine away. It’s just that anyone walking into the city’s libraries -- especially the Central Library -- could not miss the time, care and money that the city puts into the library. So the results from Hennen’s American Public Library Rankings that showed Newport’s libraries at the top of California cities with populations between 50,000 and 99,999 residents aren’t going to become a topic at the Martin W. Witte Distinguished Speakers Lecture Series.

What might make a good lecture is just how the library got so good. There’s the Newport Beach Public Library Foundation, which had a record-breaking $405,000 fundraising effort in 2003-04. (It also raised $2.2 million to help build the Central Library.) And the city provides nearly $5 million a year for its budget.

As a result, the libraries have Wi-Fi Internet access and plenty of computers, not to mention the millions of books that get checked out each year. That also still counts for something.