On May 11, Jay Leno quipped “People here in Los Angeles are upset at the mayor’s proposed plan to cut the budget of libraries… they want to cut library budgets and this could affect as many as nine people.” City Librarian Martin Gómez responded to Leno “… these cuts are no laughing matter to the 17 million people who use the city’s libraries each year.”
The U.S. Census Bureau estimates population for the city of Los Angeles at 3.8 million1 and the entire county at 9.8 million2, so Mr. Gómez has either misinterpreted his gate counts or people are consistently coming from northern California and other states to use the city’s libraries. Perhaps he has conflated gate counts and users, which seems prevalent in the library world.
The Annoyed Librarian made a similar observation about ALA President Roberta Steven’s January 2010 statement that “we had 1.2 billion people coming to our libraries across the nation and checking out 2 billion items” by noting that 1.2 billion people is roughly the population of North and South America combined. Last month, arguing against budget cuts for Queens Public Library, City Councilman Peter Koo stated that 2 million people visited the Flushing Library last year. The population of Queens is roughly 2.2 million3 and Flushing is one of 48 branches in the Queens system. I’d be surprised if 2 million people visited all the Queens libraries combined last year, let alone just the Flushing branch. Even in my home town, library statistics simply don’t jive with our region’s population.
Upon encountering these mistakes, discerning individuals may subconsciously translate users to visits, but even then — are the numbers truly representative of library usage? How likely is it library staff have reliable or consistent means to adjust gate counts to subtract for staff movement and traffic generated by service providers, volunteers, rambunctious children going in and out, and people stepping in to use the restrooms? And how do they distinguish between frequent and infrequent users? If all gate counts record is bodies physically passing through a library’s doors, they seem like a crude mechanism for assessing usage (except to convey trends as Charlotte Mecklenburg Library did in its FY2011 budget overview).4
So how many people really do use the Los Angeles Public Library for its intended purposes? We’re told it’s as few as 9 people and as many as 17 million people per year. Common sense and a bit of research suggest neither figure is credible. The lack of such basic data is a real impediment to meaningful dialogue about managing and funding this public resource.
Readers may also be interested in Thinking ’bout library card statistics and Library statistics I’d like to see.
1U.S. Census Bureau population of Los Angeles (city), 2006
2U.S. Census Bureau population of Los Angeles (county), 2009
2U.S. Census Bureau population of Queens, NY, 2000
4Gate counts for Charlotte Mecklenburg Library, 2004 – 2010
The gate count is my nemesis. Why do we hang ourselves on seemingly questionable stats? One statistic is only that. Look at a multitude of stats to show what is going on in your library.
Thanks for your candor, Shelley. I must admit, continually seeing only this one stat and having it often misstated diminishes libraries in my eyes … as transparent & well-managed organizations and resources for information literacy.
Walk-in Business is a reliable and valuable statistic. Properly used, it can demonstrate if hours, staff, or other resources need to be adjusted.
It indicates the number of people coming into the library. It does not translate to individual users, but neither does computer usage or book circulation. Staff is a very small percentage as many don’t use the main entrance.
The stats are useful, the word choice used is poor. We had visitors, but not individual users. Administrators typically use walk-in business, book circulation, and computer usage for press releases and sound bytes. It seems silly to quibble over that point.
(Also, in California, any California resident can get a library card at any California library.)
Hi Jeff – Hmmm … I didn’t think my points were a silly quibble. I see a big difference between the statements “17 million people visited” & “we had 17 million visits”. Seems to me the obligation for accuracy/clarity rests with the party making the statement versus the one receiving it. Do you see it differently?
As I replied to Shelley, it concerns me when I see straightforward data like this miscommunicated … makes me wonder whether the people making the statements are being disingenuous or whether they truly don’t know how to interpret and communicate information. Either way, my confidence in them is diminished.
Clarity and accuracy of communications was one of the points in this post. Another was that our public discourse about libraries is hampered by lack of more specific information on library usage. Without it, we’re stuck talking about the same old things in the same old ways, and that doesn’t seem to be serving us very well.
Jeff – the substance of your comment helped me think more about the conundrum of assessing and communicating library usage. You listed a few other stats such as book circ & computer usage. Is there a way to analyze the stats you collect in combination to arrive at a statement like “last year we had 5 million users who made 17 million in-person visits, borrowed 45 million print & multimedia materials and accessed our website 20 million times“?
You’re right about Mr. Gomez’s statement and those of others you cited. When called to question they sound absolutely silly.
Unfortunately it’s difficult for public library’s to keep solid statistics (though not impossible. Case in point, the reference statistics we keep at my library: every day for a week we are supposed to keep a tally of questions we are asked. These are broken down by the type of question it is (reference or informational/directional) and time of the interaction (from 0s-30s, from 31s-2m etc.). While the construction of the table is simple enough, the difficulty lies in recording the tally marks, especially when we’re busy; when there’s a line of patrons waiting for assistance, one tends to forget to keep in mind the time it took to answer the previous question, not to mention all of the intermediary questions where patrons will interrupt a reference interview asking for a writing utensil, pencil sharpener, or what have you.
In the end, at our busy library, much of the tally sheet ends up being conjecture which is counter to its purpose, no? A bit like equating gate count with library users. Suffice it to say, this is all frustrating to me, partly because I can’t think of a nimble solution.
Hi Oleg – I’ve seen lots of references to the type of tally sheet you describe. I’m curious, what’s being assessing with these particular statistics? How are they used once they’re gathered and tallied?
I believe that it’s mostly the number of questions we get though I don’t know for sure since I’m just a lowly librarian in a huge system. All of these statistics get sent to headquarters and never seen again as far as I know.
Ah, I had a hunch that was the case. Thanks for checking back, Oleg.
Granted, it should have been clearly stated that those were “visits,” not unique individuals, but why should “service providers, volunteers, rambunctious children going in and out, and people stepping in to use the restrooms” be discounted?
“And how do they distinguish between frequent and infrequent users?”
A: They don’t. Not unless we chip every patron or slap an RFID label on them.
Yes, door count is going to overcount the number of people who come in to check out a book, but we have circulation statistics for that. If we just reported circ stats, we would be ignoring all the people who come to the library for all the other programs and services that we provide.
As for the Annoying Librarian, who cares what he/she thinks? She/he hates public libraries.