Karen’s View On Library Closures

It’s often interesting to see what councillors elsewhere in Essex are saying about things.

For example, Brentwood Lib Dem Karen Chilvers writes here about reductions in library hours. She’s not impressed with the consultation:

“A resident asks me to quantify the issue I have with the ?consultation? over Brentwood Library and the proposed Sunday closure. So, here is the issue, in glorious technicolour!
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– No usage figures have been provided by Essex County Council in the consultation, this is the only document provided. It looks at population and works out a proposal on hours as a consequence as a % of catchment.
– There are issues with the catchment statistic ? they are in bandings that go up 10,000 a time and then in a massive band of 30,000 ? 100,000.
– Brentwood falls right into the middle of this band ? 30,000-100,000 people get 48 hours per week of library usage. How can populations of such a varied size (a differential of 70,000 people) be comparable on needs? In my view, there should have been more breaks in these bandings.
– These statistics are based on 2001 population statistics of 69,000 residents that don?t take account of major new developments, such as Clements Park and Rollason Way in Brentwood West alone, as well as other developments such as Highwood that will further increase the population of Brentwood (all of these in the town centre).
– So, this consultation is paying lip service to asking people what they really want. There are no options other than Sunday closure given and not even space for a comment or another opinion!
– It could be that residents prefer later opening on a couple of days of the week and keep the Sunday opening as is. Unless they ask this question, and allow people to comment, how can they know?”

Her full piece is here.