St James St Library Campaign

well after months of excuses, broken promises and chasing (the latest excuse was heavy rain!) the consultations have finally been delivered to houses in the st james st area. The council refuses to ask the right questions and they refuse to extend the deadline past 18th July despite the fact most people only received their survey today. Rest assured we’ll stay on their case about this!

In the mean time, i thought people might be interested to know how i have filled in my survey. Of course these answers are just my personal experience but thought you might find some of this useful.

q1 – more than a month ago but less than 6 months ago

q2 – no set time

q3 – no set day

Have added ‘libraries should be open mornings, afternoons and weekends’.

q4 – have ticked ‘other’ and added ‘to attempt to use reference books and borrow both fiction and non-fiction books – unsuccessfully, as reference library was closed and the books i wanted weren’t available’ AND ‘to ask librarians for assistance with looking up reference materials’

q5 – Have ticked ‘other’ and added ‘St James St Open Air Library’

q6 – have ticked ‘other’ and added ‘St James St Open Air LIbrary’, have also ticked ‘library outside borough’.

q7 – have ticked ‘other’ and added ‘St James St Open Air Library has a sense of community and a love of books that is becoming all too rare. I cannot use Central as it is too difficult to access, it has a poor range of books since most were dumped, and it is exceptionally understaffed’.

q8 – I have ticked ‘too far away’ and ‘other’ and added ‘because my local library was closed down’

q9 – i have ticked ‘other’ and added ‘re-open st james st’, ‘BETTER range of books’, ‘better trained and experienced staff’, and ‘more staff’.

q10 – i have ticked ‘very likely’

q11 – i have ticked ‘other’ and added ‘possibly, a community centre in the St James library building with a reasonable size library section. No other option is appropriate.’

q12 – I have had my little rant here. This is what I have said (I am sure you can think of your own rant!!!)

St James St Library was a great community library, value for money, staff who were knowledgable and friendly, always full of kids, people of all ages and races, and packed with a good range of books. IT was the only place to go and not spend money in this whole area. Closing it to save £70,000 is a travesty. Wasting millions on buildings whilst destroying 60% of the borough’s library books and cutting experienced staff is an outrage. The silly questions in this questionnaire seem designed to justify these outrages. No I do not want a book drop off point in a doctors surgery – I want my library back! Please ensure you take all my additional comments into account and include them in the analysis of this consultation.

Those funny folk at the council are supposedly undertaking a consultation into the future of library provision in the st james st area.  Mysteriously, though, none of the campaigners or people we’ve asked so far, have received a consultation, even though Lorna Lee (head of Library Service) told us she sent them out to every resident within about a half mile radius of the library, about 2 weeks ago.

Have YOU received a survey? Please let us know if you have, or haven’t! (email stjamesstlibrary@googlemail.com.)

Please note – the st james st library campaign does NOT endorse this survey, and it is totally up to you whether you return it.  If you do return it,

The council refused to amend the survey to make it a genuine consultation exercise.  We have seen the final draft and it does not allow people to express their views about the closure of st james st, the impact that had had on their library usage, nor people’s views on the importance of a nearby library, a good range of books to borrow, childrens books and reference books, and the importance of well trained staff (there is a question about ‘customer friendly staff’ but that sounds to me like another way of saying staff that don’t have any library training, which the library managers seem to think is fine).  By asking if you would be ‘more likely to use a library if you could return books to a GP surgery’ etc, please note what they are really asking is if this is a suitable replacement for a library, so be very careful if you answer this question!!  Also when they ask what time you use a library, be aware that the council is keen to try and replace a full time library with a weekend only library.

Our own survey of over 300 local residents, showed these were the most important things to local residents, who also wanted the existing building re-opened as a library by a majority of over 9 to 1.

The council’s survey seems designed to allow them to ’spin’ people’s views rather than genuinely reflect them. Therefore we’d encourage anyone who HAS received a survey, and who wishes to fill it in, to ignore the council’s tick boxes if they do not seem to reflect what you want to say about libraries, and to write in other answers on the form where appropriate.

Please please do let us know if you have received a survey – seems like there is something a bit fishy going on here!  We are meeting the council again on 9th July so we will be sure to get to the bottom of this as well as to press the case for re-opening of St James St Library.

Thanks!

To everyone who came today – great turnout, bout a 100 i reckon, great to see residents and the library workers standing side by side and standing up for libraries, including those who came in to talk to central library users (who were very supportive).  The only really strange comment was from the library manager who told me that it didn’t matter if sometimes the non-fiction and reference library had no staff working there at all….   anyway thanks again, check back here shortly for a fuller report.

Hi all just a quick post to say hope to see you tomorrow – the weather forecast is dry with sunny spells, so fingers crossed! We will be there, rain or shine. Don’t forget to bring any placards you may feel like making, and books to swap if you like! Let’s try and get a big turn out to show the council the strength of feeling in the community about the way they’re attacking our libraries.

If you fancy a community day of it, there is a bike afternoon at the hornbeams centre on hoe street afterwards, which sounds fun too.

After a year of campaigning the St James St Campaign has finally got the decision to close St James St referred back to Cabinet for review. This meeting is on TUESDAY 17th JUNE.

However, given what we have learned recently, the St James St Campaign is concerned that unless we make our feelings known very strongly to our councillors now, not only will they ignore us, but they’ll continue to threaten other libraries in the borough – and to victimise librarians (see below).

What is happening?

The library bosses and the councilor in charge have said they are ‘too busy’ to listen to us before the Cabinet meeting, despite the Scrutiny Committee telling them they should do this.

The council is refusing to discuss their plans for the building with residents or community groups, and spreading false rumours that it would cost a lot of money to re-open the library.

Council bosses are also threatening library staff who are trying to protect our libraries. Last week a library staff union rep was sent home without pay, for defending current levels of staffing – bosses want to open libraries with as few as 2 of the least experienced staff. Library staff across the borough walked out in protest, closing 6 libraries.

What do we want the council to do?

· Re-open St James St Library – the closure only saved £70,000, less than the council spent on training courses for councilors last year. A library provides education for thousands of people, not just for 60 councillors!

· Give a firm commitment not to close any of the other libraries in Waltham Forest.

· Take better care of the books that belong to us, the residents (250,000 books either went missing from Waltham Forest Libraries, were disposed of, or destroyed, between 2005 and 2007, according to the council’s own figures).

· Prioritise spending on the things that matter to residents – the SJSL Campaign carried out a detailed consultation of over 300 local residents which showed that people want libraries that are local, full of books, and run by experienced staff – not money wasted on fish tanks and expensive consultants! It also showed that people want the building to be a library or community centre – not council offices or sold off for housing.

· Launch a full independent enquiry into the mismanagement of library services

· Stop the victimization of library staff, and allow the suspended worker to return immediately.

What are we asking residents to do?

Contact your ward councilors (there are 3 in each ward) – via email, postal address, phone, or at their surgeries. Also contact Councillor Geraldine Reardon (Councillor for Libraries), the leader Clyde Loakes, and the other cabinet members.

Tell them about your experiences of libraries and ask them if they will back the demands listed above, and if not, why not?

Contact your local MPs, Neil Gerrard, Harry Cohen, or Ian Duncan Smith, and ask them to raise the issue with the council.

Contact Mimi Konigsberg, the Council Director responsible for libraries, Mimi.konigsberg@walthamforest.gov.uk and ask her what she is doing about this unacceptable situation.

And come to the rally on Saturday 7th June 12noon  Walthamstow Town Square – see most recent posts for more details.

Thanks!

now up on the council website here

we got over 300 responses to our consultation – the council got 29 responses to its whole consultation on the masterplan for walthamstow town centre, according to the latest cabinet papers!

Some hopeful news following the Scrutiny Committee on April 21st – the Campaign presented our case to Scrutiny committee, and they voted to recommend that the Cabinet reconsider the decision to close St James St Library, and identify sources of suitable funding to do so. Both Labour and Conservative members of the committee supported this welcome move, even though for some reason the 2 Lib Dem members (including Cllr James O’Rourke, whose own ward includes St James St Library) failed to support it (he abstained).

We are delighted with this ray of hope, which is definitely thanks to all the support we’ve had from the local community – many of our supporters were in the town hall to hear the debate, which really helped the 3 members of the campaign who presented to feel more confident!

However it is Cabinet members who control the purse strings so it’s them we need to influence now – watch this space for details of how to contact cabinet, coming very soon.

Hi there, just to say there is still one week to fill in the library survey – see links on the left.  Many thanks!

I have been forwarded this by one of my fellow SJSL campaigners….

Good luck to ‘em.  At least Devon council had a consultation before it has taken any decisions on closure.  Whilst we’ve had an overwhelming response to our own library consultation (you’ve one week left to fill it in – see link on this site!),  Waltham Forest council has now told us they’ve delayed their consultation on St James St library til May – only 13 months late…

Hmm.. maybe now we know why our council kept it secret that they were going to close the library – they must have been worried we’d all strip off if we knew about their plans!

It’s a thought!  Ahem.  Perhaps we’ll stick to the open-air library for now!

Walthamstow book-lovers braved wind and rain on Saturday [19 January]
to launch the National Year of Reading at St James Street Library,
which was closed down last year.

“We were surprised that the borough’s library service hasn’t had a
launch for 2008 as National Year of Reading, so we thought we’d do it
ourselves,” said St James Street Library Campaign. “The people here
care about books but can’t afford the high cost of buying them. They
want to be able to use their library again.”

Though the country-wide event has been ignored by Waltham Forest
council, campaigners and supporters celebrated it outside the locked
building in Coppermill Lane, London E17. Children and adults swapped
books, put up new decorations on the windows and wrote messages calling
on the council to reopen the library.

They’ve renamed the area in front of the building “St James Street
Open-Air Library”. From 2 February, they plan to hold book swaps there
on the first Saturday of every month. No tickets, no payments: everyone
is welcome to bring as many books as they like to swap.