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Board Of Library Trustees Appointed

Editor’s Note: This article was originally printed as an April Fool’s joke. It is purely satire.

Ending months of speculation, the City of Santa Clarita released a statement on Friday announcing the establishment of its Board of Library Trustees. The five members, appointed by the City Council earlier this week, will oversee the funds for the Santa Clarita Public Library, due to open July 1.

Until Friday, it was expected that the City Council members would simply appoint themselves to the board, as is the norm with most municipalities. Instead, the members opted to go with a panel of unfamiliar names and newcomers to local government.


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Beginning next week, Brian Goodell, John Naber, Matt Vogel, Kim Peyton and Jill Sterkel will be tasked with handling the $19.1-million contract with the City’s chosen library operator, Library Systems and Services.

All members are part of the City’s Youth in Government program and still in high school.

“The City of Santa Clarita is always on the cutting edge when it comes to government policy,” said Mayor Marsha McLean. “We on the Council have full confidence that these leaders of tomorrow will carry out their responsibilities.”

The move comes more than seven months after Council members voted to withdraw from the County of Los Angeles Public Library and award a five-year contract to LSSI to operate a municipal system. Since then, the Council has made payments to both LSSI and the County of Los Angeles during the transition without a board of trustees, prompting a lawsuit from Save Our Library, an opposition group.

That lawsuit, which charged that all payments toward a municipal library operation must be made under the auspices of a board of library trustees, was dismissed in late March by Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Barbara Scheper on procedural grounds. Save Our Library will not be allowed to submit an amended lawsuit.

“I’m just so happy that we’re finally able to announce our Board of Library Trustees,” said Councilwoman Laurie Ender. “We’d always planned it this way – going with these amazing kids. I can’t think of a better bunch to lead our libraries than those that will use them the most in the future.”

Despite their ages, the library board will operate like any other and meet once a month. Sterkel will serve as president and Vogel as president promote.

“I’m like totally humbled by this opportunity,” said Sterkel, a 16-year-old junior at West Ranch High School. “I’d like to thank my mom for making me do this and the City Council members for understanding the obvious link between libraries and local students.”

Sterkel, now in her third year of the Youth in Government program, has written consistently about City issues on her blog politicaligirl.com.

“That being said, I am personally guaranteeing right now that there will be changes once the five-year contract with LSSI is complete,” she said. “There’s a lot of weird junk in this contract I don’t like that will need sorting out if we choose to re-up with LSSI in five years.

“It’s not the librarians I’m worried about – it’s the management at LSSI. As President of the Library Board of Trustees, I will be on them, scheduling meetings, conference calls, whatever. When you come to us like LSSI has, you better be prepared to work.”

Vogel, 17, recently received Valencia High School’s Senior Business Award for a study on outdated service industries.

“From a financial standpoint, this makes sense for the time being,” he said. “But I think I echo Jill’s sentiment when I say that we’ll need to revamp the Santa Clarita Public Library in five years. It’s not going to make sense to have three libraries when my age group grows up shunning them and everyone who uses them now is about to die.”

Vogel might be onto something. A library records request revealed patrons age 21 and under checked out a mere total of seven books last year from the Valencia, Canyon Country and Newhall branches.

“No, I don’t go to libraries,” said Goodell, 14, via text message. “But I do read, probably more than my parents, because I’m on the Internet all day. News aggregates, magazines, blogs – I can get all that online. And when I do need a book for a book report or something stupid like that, I just have my parents buy it at a cheap price for my Kindle. Or I can just download it straight to my computer through Google Books.”

Nevertheless, the group maintains that, even with the reduction in expenses, the need for a library operator like LSSI is imperative.

“Of course, libraries can’t function on their own – we’ll need someone there,” said Sterkel. “But make no mistake, we will inevitably convert the Old Town Newhall and Canyon Country branches into hotels. And so we’re not forgetting the handful of people that spend more than 10 minutes a time at the library, we’ll establish a main facility in that forsaken Applebee’s on Valencia Boulevard, which will cost about a quarter to lease.”

According to Vogel, additional plans include using the Valencia Library as a giant warehouse for the main collection, operated by two LSSI employees.

“The Applebee’s location will be stocked with 90 computer stations, all of which will have e-book access to our entire stock. We’ll probably put a Starbucks in there too, just because,” said Vogel. “As for checking out books, patrons will need to do it online, but in five years they won’t think of doing it any other way.

Under the board’s plan, users will order the book they want online and can pick it up as early as that day at the Valencia warehouse. Another idea consists of mailing the books to a patron’s house and having them mail it back when they’ve finished reading it.

“Same idea as Netflix, but funded specifically through tax dollars,” said Vogel. “Look, we’re going to modernize the public library in a way that reflects the way kids today feel about books. We won’t even need that special library tax or whatever it’s called. We can take those tax dollars and put it toward something useful like free citywide Wi-Fi service.”

Editor’s Note: This story is 100 percent fabricated, because, well, it’s April Fool’s Day and we in the news room like to have fun. Hope you at least got a chortle out of it.

Board Of Library Trustees Appointed

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