(Oneida, NY – March 7, 2013) Registered voters in the Oneida Public Library Special District approved the library’s proposed budget for fiscal year 2013-14 by 443 votes to 233 no votes in the budget vote and trustee election that was held March 5 at the library.
Current trustees Patricia Albaugh and Robert Wilkins were re-elected to the OPL board for another five-year term, with 548 votes for Albaugh and 531 for Wilkins. Lillian White won her first term on the board with 535 votes. Their terms begin July 1, 2013, when the library’s new fiscal year begins.
The new operating budget proposed by the OPL Board of Trustees totals $375,872, an overall increase of 2.36 percent over the current year’s operating budget. Of this, the library tax levy is $326,872.
Other funding, $49,000 or 13 percent of the total, is expected to be garnered from public and private funding, individual donations and library fees. Not included in the proposed operating budget is funding for special programming and the OPL’s adult literacy services, both of which depend on grants from private foundations for support.
“The Oneida Library staff and I are deeply appreciative of the impressive support and confidence that the voters showed on March 5 when they approved by a 65 percent margin the library’s proposed operating budget for our next fiscal year, 2013-14,” said Library Director Carolyn Gerakopoulos.
“Now we can look to the future,” she added, “so we can continue to provide the many and varied services that our community has come to expect. We feel that the Oneida Public Library is truly the place where the community connects.”
In 2012, the OPL had an attendance of 78,345 individual visits, a total circulation of all materials of 90,692 items and 891 library and community program sessions with a total attendance of 10,018 people. By year’s end, the OPL had 13,922 current registered borrowers with OPL library cards.