STATE AID TO LIBRARIES

                    By C. B. LESTER, Secretary
                Wisconsin Free Library Commission

S TATE aid to libraries! To most of us this phrase means, first of
    all, the proposals for a state equalization fund to provide state
aid in money for local library services. Thirty per cent of all Wis-
consin people still live in areas that are without any local library
                     service. A nortion of our neonle. greater in


number than the total population of Milwaukee,
Racine, and Kenosha Counties taken together,
must now depend for their library service upon
the Traveling Library Department or other
outside sources. Lack of local financial ability
and scattered population account for this, for
all of these people live in rural areas. Large
area services, county or regional, must be de-
veloped for them.
  Many libraries in villages and small cities
are struggling to carry on their job without
the financial base necessary for it. Suppose we
---sure the ahilitv fto nrovide this base bv the


    C. B. LESTER     tax valuation. The average per capita tax valu-
ation for the whole state is $1,500. Perhaps all those municipalities-
county, village, city-with an average tax valuation less than $1,000,
or two-thirds of the state average, may be assumed to have a burden
of tax support which will not permit extension of library funds to
an adequate figure.
  Provision of library service for rural areas and provision of as-
sistance to those localities with lower financial ability of their own-
these two together form the primary objective of a state aid program
such as was proposed in the bill introduced in both houses in the
1939 session of the legislature. The bill was given sympathetic con-
sideration by committees in both houses, but the pocketbook was flat
when funds were sought to carry out this proposal. However, if ade-
quate library service means anything in the educational advance-
ment of both adults and children, if it means anything in the
promotion of enlightened citizenship, state aid to equalize the tax
ability to provide it is the only answer. It must come if Wisconsin
is to provide for rural people a library service fairly commensurate
with what is so well done for most urban people in many cities and
villages. The Wisconsin Library Association is committed to this
program, speaking not only for organized library workers but also,
and more important, for the citizen sentiment which supports the
existing library work.