Last week, Anita Coleman published an opinion piece pitting Irvine’s move towards ranked choice voting (RCV) against Irvine’s new library system. In it she implies the council members who agendized RCV are distracted, unable to focus on Irvine Public Library (IPL). Respectfully, her positing RCV as somehow connected to IPL’s future is the real distraction.
The unfortunate reality is IPL was headed to a funding shortfall long before conversations about RCV reached the dais this spring. In fact, it’s thanks to the very Councilmembers she calls into question that things are (ever so slowly) moving towards more stable ground.
Fated from the start
The agreement to separate from OCPL was negotiated in closed session and unfortunately resulted in a suboptimal outcome for Irvine. A full accounting is offered here, but important details include:
- Conceding ~$9M/year in Irvine tax revenue to the County in perpetuity.
- Relinquishing $29M in Irvine taxpayer set-aside funds in exchange for a collection of used books, furniture, and 1 year of OCPL-operated library services (valued at ~$5M).
- A five-year lease for University Park Library set at $40K+ per month, not to be renewed.
- Closing Katie Wheeler Library.
In the two years since the deal was minted, lauded, and put into motion its inadequacies have become painfully apparent.
Thankfully, some of the deal’s bad outcomes have been reversed. For example, Katie Wheeler is back into IPL’s portfolio (at least for now) and University Park’s future looks a bit rosier with Councilmember Martinez-Franco and colleagues jumping on Vice Chair Katrina Foley’s invitation to pursue a 20 year lease of the site. (See Page 14, here.) Nevertheless, the hard truth is that Irvine administers a library system that is the same square footage it was under OCPL for approximately double the cost. If this alarms you, you are not alone. Councilmember Treseder and colleagues have called for a procedural audit that will hopefully daylight what happened behind closed doors to push this deal through and what recourse, if any, is available to the City.
The decision whether to pursue this crucial audit is Item 7.1 of the Irvine City Council agenda for June 23. We urge library advocates interested in securing a sustainable future for IPL to focus their energy on registering their strong support for a procedural audit of the Irvine Library System Transition here.
How does RCV figure in this conversation?
Short answer: it doesn’t.
The future of IPL lies in conversations that daylight the negotiation that gave way to our extremely unfavorable exit deal with the County. Conversations about the now past-due Library Advisory Committee by-laws and IPL strategic plan. Conversations about the major capital campaigns, grassroots fundraising, and potential tax measures that may or may not get us where we need to go. We could go on.
If we must talk about RCV, here is what these two advocates have to say: The costs associated with this ballot measure are paltry compared to what it will take to stabilize and expand IPL such that it meets our city’s base need for library services, saying nothing of developing the “world class” library system we were promised. As Voice of OC has reported recently, there are other expenditures that may bear scrutiny over the pittance being proposed to give voters the chance to optimize how they exercise their most fundamental democratic right.
Moreover, the implication that Councilmembers Liu, Martinez-Franco, and Treseder are distracted by RCV is a disservice to their ongoing efforts to secure IPL. Councilmember Liu has Katie Wheeler Library in her district, and has been a steady voice for its preservation as well as an advocate for a neighbourhood library/community center hybrid in North Irvine. This proposal is arguably the most credible and likely-to-succeed of all future library plans thus far. In an effort to reign in costs and secure the future of University Park Library, Councilmember Martinez-Franco sought to purchase UPL this spring. Though the County adamantly declined, when Vice Chair Supervisor Foley offered her help to secure a 20-year lease for University Park, Martinez Franco led the effort to put that process in motion. Meanwhile, Councilmember Treseder has been spearheading the establishment of the Library Advisory Committee and championing scrutiny of the Irvine library transition through the procedural audit mentioned above. We are grateful to these three for being such consistent library voices. As a matter of fact, we appreciate our Council as a whole for their earnest engagement every time library items have came before them this year, and their near unanimous support for one another’s efforts to move IPL forward.
Lee Handy has lived in Irvine for 24 years and served as a volunteer at University Park Friends of the Library since 2015. Michaela González Montaner has lived in Irvine since 2018 and is a mom to two young children. Together with library advocates from across Irvine they are co-founders of www.saveuniversityparklibrary.org and www.iplforall.org
Opinions expressed in community opinion pieces belong to the authors and not Voice of OC.
Voice of OC is interested in hearing different perspectives and voices. If you want to weigh in on this issue or others please email opinions@voiceofoc.org.
For a different view on this issue, consider:
