2011 Election Issues: Brian K. Wydajewski, Orland Park Public Library Candidate

Eight candidates are vying for three seats in this year’s board of trustees race. Patch spoke with incumbent candidate by telephone Tuesday about the libraries funding woes and the importance of electronic books.

What is the biggest problem(s) facing the library? How do you propose to solve it?

Good question. I would say these days, the biggest issue that we’re facing, as well as any other library in the area, is the issue of funding. You’ve got a tax base that is going down—the economy is still teetering—so we don’t necessarily have the same financial resources to work with that we may have had in the past. On that basis, we really need to be especially prudent in how we handle our funds these days to make sure we’re using those resources so that we can provide the best service possible to the patrons of the library.

How do you propose constructing a budget that doesn’t burden taxpayers, while keeping the library competitive and desirable?

Well, you know, it goes back to the old adage that you have to live within the means that you have. That’s kind of the way the library has always handled its finances, even before I was part of the library board, and I’m sure going into the future. I think everyone involved with the library has been very conscious of understanding that you have to work within the resource that are provided to you, and you can’t overstep those boundaries that are placed upon you.

I think the fortunate thing, in the case of the library, is that those budgetary restraints are not necessarily a hamper on what we try to provide for the village residents because a lot of what we focus on these days is driven by available technologies, and a lot of these technologies allow for us to do things on a much more cost-efficient basis than clearly what was the case in the past—also is the case of what some other governmental entities can’t do that we can do.

How do you propose bringing talented artists and authors to the library, upping the number of library card holders and bringing those members through the doors?

The biggest thing that we tried to do and continue to try to do is really kind of offer a diversity in the programs that we provide, so that we can attract a broader range of people, depending on how you want to slice and dice people up. Whether it’s age groups or interest groups, we’ve really worked hard to kind of bring programs to the library that are going to be of interest to those different groups. In terms of how we actually attract talented people to come to the library and present, it’s really just (about) trying to provide an attractive forum and an attractive audience for them, and just try to work with them on a personal level to have them interested in coming to the library.

Obviously, we don’t have resources to pay huge dollars to bring in really expensive talent. And that’s OK, because there’s plenty of really talented people—people (who) others are really interested in hearing and learning from and we’ve been really fortunate to be able to bring those people to the library, and obviously we’re going to continue those efforts.

Some say the state’s financial woes threaten Orland Library’s system of exchanging books with other libraries. What is your understanding of this issue, and how should Orland Library prepare in the event it needs fund its own delivery of books?

Yeah, it is a difficult issue to deal with. You know, there are these library systems that are set up on a regional basis, where effectively you have all of the libraries in the area that kind of form a group, and through the particular system they provide a lot of different services, amongst those member libraries, including moving materials from library to library, maintaining databases and information that is utilized by all of the libraries. For the most part, those systems have been funded by the state. Given the state’s budgetary woes, a lot of these systems have really struggled and in some cases have kind of fallen apart.

In terms of trying to deal with the delivery issue and how we would deal with it, to the extent it dropped in our laps, it is an issue but from my perspective it’s becoming less and less of an issue simply because so many of our patrons are turning to electronic materials—electronic books and things of that nature—and to the extent that we’re dealing with those types of materials we don’t have the need of physically moving books from place to place; everything can be done on an electronic basis. While it is an issue, particularly for materials that are not in an electronic format, for the materials that are moving towards that format or already in that format, I think the delivery issue becomes less and less of a concern.

The Smart Energy Design Assistance Center performed a study on the library this summer and determined its energy consumption was higher than average. The study offered several recommendations to curb consumption. Which recommendations do you support? Are there any other ways you propose cutting back on energy?

Oh, gosh. Off the top of my head I don’t remember specifically what the recommendations were. We had commissioned the study to further our efforts of going green as a library, and we were interested in getting an outsiders view on kind of where energy consumption was occurring within the building and how we might improve it. My recollection was that there were four or five recommendations, all of which had good merits and I think we decided to adopt them not in the full manner that was contemplated in (but) at least a partial manner. It’s one of those things where I think it’s going to be a continual process. I don’t think one study is going to be the end-all be-all and the changes that we make based on the recommendations are going to be it. It’s going to be something we’re going to have to continue to monitor and move towards as new technologies are developed, as there are newer ways to continually work towards our consumption as much as possible.

What’s you favorite book?

(Laughs) Probably Great Expectations by (Charles) Dickens. My grandfather kind of got me hooked on Dickens when I was younger, and fortunately a lot of the Dickens books were part of what was covered during grammar school, so I got the opportunity to read those a number of times. In my mind, Dickens was an author that very few people compare to.