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Sonoma County, a diverse county of over one million acres, is famed for its agriculture, industry and recreation, boasting a booming economy and unique lifestyle for its citizens. Described by the same Luther Burbank as the chosen spot of all the Earth, Sonoma County is the place to

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live, work and play as we move into the 21st century. Led by the forward looking philosophy of its governing bodies, Cinema Counties, 340,000 residents are, Ah, harmonious, successful blend of ethnic and economic backgrounds. We invite you to take a closer look at Sonoma County in the

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nineties with your host rich McGlinchy. How you doing? Everybody Welcome to another edition of Sonoma County in the nineties. On this program, we're gonna be talking to a gentleman who heads an institution that happens to be one of my personal favorites. The library, when I use

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a lot and and have great respect for the gentleman I'm talking about is David Price. And he has Arsenal County library director in charge of our library system. He visited with his last year in the confines of spring right Clark and told us a little bit

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about his background his history and, ah, different jobs that he's held before he became or library director. And now he's been here with us about a year, and a lot of things have happened. One of the things I noticed is it Snowmen County Library, uh, opened

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a new branch, I guess you'd say, in the Eastern Rose attacks in Drinking Valley. How did that come about? Especially now, with only a fiscal restraint. Well, that's Ah, it's an excellent question, rich. And thank you again for first letting me be here this morning. Um,

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yes, we did. We opened a Rincon Valley library in August of this year, and it's a brand new 15,000 square foot facility. It's, Ah, very state of the art. In terms of the technology the library has over 39 has 39 computer terminals inside of it. It

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has this new CD, Rahm Technology. It has the Internet, it has cable television, and it has also satellite television as well. So we've got a lot of technology built into one one building, and I think if you think about it and as public sees that building

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and uses it, they'll see, really, what a prototype of a library of the future is all about, but it's a lovely place. David, I I must admit something. My ignorance, sir. I drove by a little that way. I drove by and down a lot of Seigo.

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Oh, every day for months I saw this nice built into going up there, but I didn't have enough sense to call downtown. Say, by the way, what's happening are asked there. And then suddenly, one day I see the beautiful sign of their Recon Valley library. So

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I found out what was really went in. And it is You are absolutely right. It's a prototype of an excellent labor. We were very fortunate. Back in 1990 the library Snowmen County Library received a grant from the state of California under the Proposition 85. And that

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proposition made available monies to help build public libraries across California. And we were one of the, uh, library systems in the state that was able to receive almost over $4 million to build that library. And so that's one of the reasons that it it's there today.

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Well, you know, a moment ago you talked about the the state of the art technology that exists in that Rick in Valley Branch. But what about the other libraries? The county? Well, where were pretty advanced in terms of public library technology everywhere in the county? The

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the other libraries do not have the same level of technology that we see at the rink in Valley. But we do have a computerized catalogue that has all the holdings of every library in the system. At every library. We do have personal computers and all of

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our libraries that the public can use for either adults are our Children, and we have the CD. Technology is starting to come into some of our libraries, so I think you're going to see more and more of that being available all across the county. Yeah, David,

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generally the Internet of the information superhighway that is getting a lot of attention in the press media these days. I don't know whether everybody understands what is the Internet. Well, it's say it's an actually, it's a what's called a network of networks. It's been around a

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very long time, but it's been available only to an exclusive group of people, primarily people in research and university professors and academic scholars and so forth. And when President Clinton was elected Vice president, Gore took up the cause of trying to create what they called in

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the information superhighway and to build that across all of all of the United States with Snow my county library. We received a grant from the California State Library back in 1991. Teoh implement the Internet into Sonoma County. We were the first public library in California, toe

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actually have access to the Internet, and we opened that this year in March of 1994 and we went through in The way we've done it is we've put all of our computer technology connected in to Cinema State, and so we've got a line between us and

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Cinema State, and then we go into the California State University system, and then we connect to all of the libraries and in the Internet all over the world. So it's possible for if you were looking for a newspaper article, for example, and you wanted Teoh us

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to look at it, we could go into the Internet and find a place that would house that article and even be able to either print that article off our retrieve it from the whoever owned that article and in the near future will be able to do

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even more. It's amazing. How is the public using the Internet? And maybe it's the second part of that question. What can we expect from Internet in the future? But we could Right now we've started by allowing the public to come in and use it in the

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libraries, every computer terminal that we have, and we have over 200 terminals throughout the county that has access to the Internet. So if you go into a library in Cloverdale or Petaluma, our Santa Rosa doesn't matter where. UM, you can go on to the catalogue and

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then connect into the Internet and then search. And what you usually would search for is like, if you were looking for government information, are materials that Aaron, other libraries across the world are. If you were trying to find out facts and information, now there's some other

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components that we do not have available today, and that's the ability to email and eventually do. What I talked about earlier is file transfer, where we can actually bring the rial materials are across electronically, back to to you, and so we'll be looking at that in

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the future. Well, the Internet itself is a It's just kind of a unified information center. All of people that tie into it, that's right, reach anything that they need or want. That's right. Like if somebody were living in New York and they're interested in California wines,

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for example, they could through their computer, at a home or at a university or whatever. They could actually dial into the Internet and get to the Snowmen County Library catalog and know what we have in our wine library in Hills, Berg and all right along that

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line. What other technology can be public expect from the library in the future? Well, I think you've you're seeing. And probably at this holiday season, you know that multimedia computers are becoming very, very popular, and they're starting, and that's all built around this CD Rahm technology.

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Right now we see a lot of these games and and so forth, but there's gonna be a lot of information that's coming into CD Rome, and I predict that that will be a major area of technology advancement for the future and how that will be beneficial

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toe libraries is that the materials, the reference materials will be so much more available. For example, you could get an entirely encyclopedia on a little disc, get so yeah, and that's gonna be that's really gonna be the incredible aspect of all of that. She don't disguise.

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It's beyond me is beyond me. It gets beyond me too. Well, listen, everybody knows that the libraries have been hit pretty hard in the state budget in the well, I guess. And last year or maybe in the last few years has this normal kind of library

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experience severe budget restrictions way haven't experienced way, haven't experienced severe reductions. What we've experienced is that our growth is is really very flat were we are very fortunate in Sonoma County because of the way that the library was structured several years ago, we were set up

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as a joint powers authority, and so we received a fix of the property tax base in on a predictable amount every year. And that method has allowed us to continue to have a growth. But obviously, as the county economy and as the property tax taxes have

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slowed down, then we're slowing down as well. But But we've been able to maintain our hours. We've been able to maintain add a library facility, and we've been able to maintain our services without severe reductions at all. So I feel very fortunate that that were really

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ahead of most of the public libraries in California that have had severe, said guys, When you do have reductions, you do it by attrition or something, which is so much, you know, I mean, they put a little bit more of a load over here, but it's

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really the way to do it, because the people who have been there for a long time and desire to work and need to work are able to continue and seriously, that somebody else is pretty to leave. That's right. And what's really interesting about these economic times

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is that as the economy slows down often, library demands go up because people need information, they need help with business and other kinds of things. You know, I found it. More people, more unemployment rises. In most cases, more people use the library. That's correct. Yes, I

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mean, they're either looking in there for for opportunities. Or maybe they just having anything to do, right? The president going on there to read, use the library for So that's exactly one of the things the trend for Ah, I guess you'd call it public library financing.

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How can that be improved? David? Well, I think that's a very serious and very significant question because most of the county libraries in California are dependent upon property tax. And when the state Legislature changed the property tax formulas a couple of years ago, that that hurt

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a lot of public libraries across the state. And, um, because they weren't set up where they had the guarantee like we do and so that that's a significant issue. I think that community support and community demands are gonna have to b'more stronger. And libraries gonna have

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to be a major portion are a major part of the priorities of what public service is all about. And so we're gonna have to really ask people more locally to support our libraries and to and to use them effectively. And so it's going to really take

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some time to really answer that question well. But it's a question that we've got to really find some better answers. For what about your compatriots in the library field? Are they joining together in any way to solve some of these problems? Yes, we're moving much more

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into cooperation and, for example, here in and what's called the North Bay north of San Francisco. The libraries of Marin and Solano County, Napa County and then Casino County and, of course, Sonoma County in Lake County have all joined together in a cooperative service. And so

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we worked together on areas like when people asked for books from one library to another. They we provide delivery so that we can get materials across these boundaries, and we also help each other in reference work and information. And we loan our materials back and forth

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so that we can share more materials and not have to buy those materials everywhere locally. And that saves a lot of money, and it also helps get the materials faster. We're gonna positive, remember, before we do want to make one statement to you, ladies and gentlemen

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in the audience, If there's any way you can help your local library or they may need volunteers, they mean the assistance they may need they put on fun drives of some sort, sometimes rather to get certain project. By all means give it serious consideration, because the

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library's today are one of the finest, as such we have. And they are definitely the tool that our young people are going to need to succeed this world and to make it hopefully a better place than it is right now. We're gonna pause right here and

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bring the audience of public service announcement after which will come back. That's a lot of more interesting questions to ask David Price. But first this important Reggie E. O You like here Tuesday and said he couldn't decide whether you should buy around her legs. African

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American DJs didn't have an easy road. In 1929 Jack Cooper had to buy airtime and find sponsors. Pioneers invented Jibe gave black musicians a chance to be heard in 1949. Jack, the rapper Gibson was the first black T J on a black owned station. To get

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There are hundreds of black days, and that's the truth putting to beat in the booth business of black music. Welcome back to this edition of Sonoma County in the nineties. We're talking with David Price. David Price is the director of the Snow McCann E Library system.

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Been with us? Ah, little over years, Doing a splendid job. One of their newest jewels, I guess you might say in the library system, is the Rincon Valley system itself out Drinking Valley Library. And it's It's a lovely building. It's really futuristic and water in its

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operation. That may be so much, and it's appearance. It's very attractive. But inside it's really something. All right, dammit, Getting back Teoh the subject of him. What are some of the new and exciting events that have occurred in this no maternity libraries in this past year?

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Well, as we earlier said, Rich, the Internet was introduced for the first time. Of course, that was a major event for us, and and then, as we move towards last summer, we had our really our first major summer reading program for Children in the county that

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we had. We joined with Clover Store Netta, the milk and company. That, and put on are all of the milk cartons that during the summer, information about the library reading program and that had over 4000 Children enter the reading programs and they read numbers of books.

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And they participated in what we call them reading as a magic program and and so really made an effort to ensure that Children were participating in in are in the library services here that during the summer, because that's the time If Children don't get active, they

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fall back in there reading those particularly those early elementary school ages. So the library mentally made a major effort, and also we were helped by the Snowmen County Transit and Santa Rosa Transit in terms of making every library a bus stop for Children to learn how

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to get to a library and and promote their readings. So I'm really very proud of what we've done with that tie in with business as you're doing there now. For instance, when you put something in the milk carton, I know we years ago we were doing

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a decorator showcasing Clover was kind enough to advertise it for that, and it made that thing a fabulous 60 it's amazing. All the milk let's purchased and then people will look at what's there. Yes, and take advantage of it now. Um, I want what I'm trying

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to say, I think Is it the school drivers in the county are struggling pretty badly. That's right. What is your library doing to help that where we're working very hard to cooperate with all of the school district's with that throughout the county. To be sure that

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that we know more about what reading needs that kids have, that we are understanding more about what homework assignments are being made and so that we can help the schools with those kinds of issues and because what I found when I came here is that often

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a student would come into a library and they may be the first student in, and so they could get the books and the materials they need for their homework assignment. But it let's say that the other 29 in a class of 30 would not that those

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materials would be checked out and gone, and so that would not be available to them. And we don't have enough school out reading materials in the county to really be able to support all of the educational needs. So we're working with the Sonoma County Office of

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Education to really try toe to help that effort and working with classroom teachers and throughout all of the school district's really trying to make a real effort to be sure that kids have the materials they need to be successful in school. I commend Jr Group on

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that, too, because when you can work with the superintendent of schools, Sonoma State University of the Sun Rose, a junior college and the teachers in the district like that, you are going even beyond the call of duty and serving the community, which is what it's. It's

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a combination of the couple cooperation. Oh, that's so vital here. Yes, that's absolutely true. And, you know, Cinema State University in Santa Rosa Junior College and all of the schools are very much a part of that community. Aziz, you called it in quite rightly. And so

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it's really important that we do cooperate and we make sure that everybody is successful. And so we've really tried to lead that and and be a you've got it. Yeah, I believe so. Going back to the business connection, if you will. I understand the libraries now

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have joined the chambers of commerce. That's what does this mean that you really are reaching even further in that community. We're in most of the communities. Each of the branch librarians is now a member of the local chamber of commerce. And, uh, we were received a

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grant again from the state of this last year. That was $10,000 to buy business materials that we could put into the Central Library and provide workshops to assist businesses in terms of grant writing and other ways to help small businesses. So we've been promoting business and

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working with the business community Thio, Thio even help the economy in the county. In that sense, you mentioned earlier on you mentioned Internet How Ellis is the library, working with Santa Rosa Junior College Community and the Cinema State College. Well, we're doing Yeah, it's ah well,

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one of things, of course, is the Internet connections. But our staffs get together now, and we talk about mutual issues. One. It's so very important to do that because the the public that often will use the College of the universities will ask the same questions of

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us. And so we spend a lot of time sometimes chasing information that if we just knew that it was already being answered, that we could save that time. So we do staff cooperation efforts. We share public documents between Cinema State University in the public Library to

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be sure that government documents and public information is really available both to students and to the general public. So, you know, and then and then we meet regularly just to be sure that we're all working in the same direction. And I think that's very important. Oh,

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a man. How is the Normal County Library working with Sonoma County in its reorganization of it? But when I came here, the county was starting to go through the reorganization process, and I had had some experiences in the past in in the areas of public administration,

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and as a result, the county administrator and the supervisors asked me, Teoh, participate in some of the reorganization process. So I was asked to specifically work on the budget and finance matters and is one of the results of that was a more streamlined budget process that

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the county has adopted. I've been asked to work on the civil service, what they call the Blue Ribbon Committee and re examining how civil service can work more effectively for the county, and we're in that process right now. So I'm representing the county department heads and

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at that effort, and we've worked this year and supporting the United Way and being sure that in helping the the county employees, you know, be a participant in those efforts. So I think we've been involved by the way before. We're going further on the questions. I

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want to get in for a personal note in House. My friend Jim Risch Cianci. He's doing well. Hey said he's the man. That's the Internet guru. I think he's Yes, he's. He's been primarily responsible being sure that the Internet is Aziz, effective as it is today.

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Jim and I were photographers for the Petaluma newspaper in the late sixties. You had been a photographer. So way back. Great. Alright, David, with all of the technology and the cooperation, are people still reading enjoying the library? There's no doubt about that. You know, you think

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about all this technology and so forth, but where when, when we get back to basics and we talk about reading, particularly last year, the Snowmen County Library circulated over 2.5 1,000,000 books. And that is, if you think about that. And what kind of value that we

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received from that. The average cost of a book these days is about $20. So we put over $50 million worth of library and materials into the into the county. And when you think about doing that, our budget is about $7 million. So you know, it's almost

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a six times return on terms of the dollars that are spent. Public gets back so much more. Yeah. Listen, you know one of the things I think we ought to do before we go any further, what is the number of the library phone number? Um, that's

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safe. 5 to 50831 5 to 5.31 Family. That's right. Um, are 58 pliable week now? I don't know which is it Now tell me again. 5 to 5083 55 31 All right. It is right there. 5 to 50 actually wants fresh. Somebody wants to inquire about

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some of the things we've said that I I advise people to check the phone books because it's always better to call the local library. So if you live in Cloverdale, for example, call that library are call if you live in Santa Rosa, call that library. Get

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in better in and the materials are usually more locally available. In that sense, gave What is the, uh, you should see the status of adult literacy in Sonoma County. The reason, I ask, that is understand that the library has a program for adults who need toe

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to improve their reading skills. Do yes, we do. We have a an adult literacy program that we've had for a number of years. Recently, there was a study done by the state of California that said that one out of every five adults in California and that

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that was later backed up by a study done on the national level. But but 20% of our population has reading difficulties, are are illiterate and has a, um, literacy kinds of needs. So in snow, my county, we don't have a specific number like that. But we

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do know that there is a great demand for reading and learning to read and the need for that kind of assistance the library has put together a literacy program that is a one on one type of consultation. We use volunteers and and we help people that

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have that kind of a need. And we've got a number of success stories of people that have gone for greater, totally illiterate to wear, reading and being productive citizens. Today we're doctor. About a minute and 1/2. There's one quick question I want to ask you understand?

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You were elected the vice president and president elect, California Library associate. That's right. First of all, congratulations, you know. Secondly, what does that mean for you? Or sit on the county? Well, it means a lot of work because I'm in. I will be in a position

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to represent all libraries in California in terms of some of the issues that we just talked about on this program. Today, with financial issues and with technology issues rising as such, I'll be in a position to help that and help make that a success throughout the

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state. You'll have clout. Yes. What do you mean? Well, we typically the year that I'll be president, will be in Southern California typically always go north, south, north south to work there and that is, that is not all the libraries and come from yes, in all

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the librarians and the professional members of library staffs. So it's a it's a big association has over and rock number of people in it. David, you've been a splendid guest, as usual, and you've imparted a lot of information to people about the library. Thank you very

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much. Very much for coming and joining me again. You an, uh, have you back again? Sometimes you got Specter that Internet gets going the better. Ladies and gentlemen, I've been talking to David Price, the director of the cinema kind of library system. The program is to

00:29:18.670 - 00:29:32.950

know McCain in the nineties. On your whole stretch. My attention. We'll be back next week with another member of the county government, family or some related agency or interesting individual kill. And tonight, good luck and good help each and every one of them go visit your

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library.