A lot goes into library services that may be invisible to a certain percentage of patrons, but which are essential to others. However, I find it interesting (and, I admit, frustrating) that your library seems to be providing the usual “library experience” that most people wish for–e.g., a safe place to go to warm up or cool off, use a computer freely, and check out materials. What’s your beef? And what are you fixing by offering a different option that will compete with the public library and possibly take away circulation numbers in such a way that it could become even *less* “fully funded” (this can mean ANYTHING, and I strongly suspect you don’t know how costs break down at your public library)?
The library experience is subjective, but as a public librarian, I can tell you that libraries cannot be everything to everyone, and this does sometimes get in the way of folks using them the way they’d like to be able to. And that is a shame. But the answer is not to offer a competing service. The answer is to get involved in your local government, pass referenda that levy taxes to pay for more/better library services (among others), and understand that usage = funding. You are not helping your community by building your own private library. But perhaps that was never your goal
