Felton Hours to Be Cut

Dear Felton Library Friends --

Earlier this month, the Library Joint Powers Board requested the Acting Library Director to balance the 2009-10 budget without closing any of the ten branch libraries. Yesterday she issued two proposals with differing amounts of cuts to accomplish this goal. The proposals will be discussed at the Board meeting next Monday night, June 1, at 7:30, in the Board of Supervisors meeting room in the County Building, 701 Ocean St.

The proposals both reduce open hours at the Felton branch to eight hours per week, with a proposed schedule of two weekday afternoons, 1-5 pm. Other small branches have proposed hours ranging from eight to twenty, while larger branches would be open 24-32 hours, and the Central branch would be open 36-40 hours per week.

To read the proposals in their entirety, go to: http://www.santacruzpl.org/news/2009/may/28/2009-2010-library-budget-proposal-lower-revenues-r/

In voting to keep all branches open and to spread the pain between them all, a principle cited by several Board members was to "prune, but prune to recover." We can be grateful that our Felton library and the enthusiasm we have for library services in the San Lorenzo Valley will not be entirely suspended. Keeping our branch and our Friends organization alive during these dire times gives us the greatest chance of accomplishing our goal of the new San Lorenzo Valley community library that our residents deserve.

FLF members will attend the June 1 meeting and will be prepared to defend the smaller libraries should the need arise. We invite anyone interested to join us as a show of support for the best possible library service for ALL areas of the County.

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Cuts to Library Funding

Felton Library Friends --

Last week, the Library Joint Powers Board voted to balance its 2009-2010 budget without closing any of the ten branches of the Santa Cruz Public Library System. For a report on the decision, go to http://www.thevalleypost.com/article.php?id=744

Acting Library Director Susan Elgin will soon submit to the Board various proposals for cutting the budget without closing branches. These will vary in how many hours different branches are kept open, how much money is retained for purchase of books and other materials, and how many library staff are affected. The Board will discuss those proposals at its meeting of June 1, at a location yet to be announced.

Felton Library Friends will continue to advocate for cuts that spread the pain of this economic crisis . This will help bring all library supporters together and will protect our system for the day when funds are more plentiful. We support San Lorenzo Valley library users accepting their share in cuts to branch hours and services. However, we will advocate for our community branch libraries, the heart of our system, not bearing a greater proportion of cuts than the larger branches,

Look for another FLF email soon regarding the coming proposals and the June 1 meeting.

"At the moment that we persuade a child, any child to cross that threshold into a library, we change their lives forever, for the better" -- Barack Obama

Felton Branch Once Again Threatened

Felton Library Friends --

The Felton branch is once again threatened with closure. Acting
Director Susan Elgin, in a memo posted on the library website today,
outlines five possible scenarios to balance its budget. Two of these
include the closure of the Felton branch. Others include cutting
hours at all branches somewhat equally, cutting larger branches more
while leaving community branches less affected, and other ways to
reach a total budget cut of 1.2 million.

To read the entire document, go to the library website at:

http://www.santacruzpl.org/

and click the link under "What's New" for "Library Budget - Closing
the Gap between Revenues and Expenses (a Memo from the Acting
Director)." Click "Library Budget Memo" to download and read the PDF.

This memo was released just prior to the monthly meeting of the
Library Joint Powers Board tonight at the City of Santa Cruz Council
Chambers at 7:30. Members of the FLF steering committee plan to attend
and speak. Join us if you can. We will send out a follow-up email
reporting on the meeting along with strategies on writing letters to
Joint Powers Board members and attending future board meetings. We
encourage you to pencil in the next Board meeting, currently scheduled
for Monday, June 1, at 7:30 p.m. in Santa Cruz.

FLF will continue to advocate for the importance of keeping the
Felton branch open during this dire economic situation.

SLV Poetry Reading - 2009

(click to enlarge program above)

Felton Library Friends is proud to be the sponsor of the annual San Lorenzo Valley Poetry Contest, held for the fifth time in 2009. One hundred and forty-nine poems by nearly as many poets were submitted on the theme of "nature." Entries in four age categories were judged by poet and teacher Rosie King. Winning poems were read by the poets, and guest readers shared some of their favorite poems.

A moss covered branch A moss covered branch for me to jump and sit on Trees to look at The wind to feel and the river to hear singing Sophia Barrus, 2nd place, Age 4-8

I see a Chinese tree
and a jogger running on a bridge
I like to pick up brown sticks
and mossy twigs
and rocks everywhere

Kief Laughron, 2nd place, Age 4-8

Keep it Wild! keep it wild everyone! keep it wild everyone! the sun the rain and the fog all come down from the sky and do you know why? that's nature. and do you know what? I'm wild too! Madilyn Strubing, First Place, Age 4-8

Armadillo Lizard

There is an armadillo lizard in me
Sharp teeth and lethal tail
It's silent like the sky
It rolls like a boulder
It lives in my feelings

Jack Chatoff, Honorable Mention, Age 9-12

Animal in Me

There is a Tiger in me,
a heart of honor,
beating thoughts,
and shyness to my core.
It sounds like the roar of thunder.
It creeps like a thief in the night
It lives in my spirit.

Annabella Castagna, Honorable Mention, Age 9-12

Spring

Like fast and furious flocks of
flourishing feathers,
it makes rain run around in a wrath
of worry.
wind

Charlie Escott, Second Place, Age 9-12

Baby Bird Haiku

Baby bird is born
Safe in its nest as a child
His mother feeds him

Sunshine sings soon now
In summer he learns to fly
Swooping as he hums

Leaves fall around him
He senses something coming
He knows he must go

He must fly from cold
Swooping south looping away
Safe now cold is gone

Andre' Collen, First Place

Age 9-12

Dancer in the Night

I sit beneath the autumn sky
The wind rustling through the leaves

The hoof beats softly in the mud
Slowly, I let time pass me by

Hear the whispers of the river
The stars reflected in his eyes

The moonlight casting shadows of
My dark black dancer in the night

Emily Rose, Second Place, Age 13-17

My Home in the Forest

My home is in the forest:
The glistening dew on the leaves,
The high branches and dark bark,
The silk water of the creek,
The deep roots of the trees,
The soft wispy breeze,
The last thump that echoes as the forest falls asleep,
The chirp of the early bird, the jumping of deer,
The inevitable essence of my home.
I belong to the forest, it belongs to me:
My home is in the forest.
The forest is in me.

Cole Morris, First Place, Age 13-17

Boundaries?


What dead old men decided
That nature ends where I begin?
No!
That boundary that I call my skin
Is how the stuff of me stays in
But also where I join the world
The breath of breeze
The burn of sun
The million cilia that celebrate
Each time I breathe
The cool of air
The tiny bones inside my head
That ring when something sweet is said
My nostrils fringed inside with hair
That beckon jasmine’s perfume in
If I am here and you are there
What fills the open space between?
The sky looks blue
The grass seems green
What difference if my eyes can’t see?
Is nature that?
Is nature me?
How did we come to label us
As only that which can discuss?
The lines that limit you from me
Are just mistaken fantasy.
The edges that set me apart
From all I love with all my heart
Keep me enclosed and make me wait
Until I close my eyes and feel
The way that I connect and heal
Breathe deep and air pulls fragrance in
The zephyr blesses grateful skin
The senses freed, partition dies
I'm nature’s child behind my eyes

Beth Benjamin, honorable mention, adult category

Good Neighbors Most trees are preoccupied. Not the one next door; she leans in and listens like a curious stranger in a check-out line, standing near without intruding, seemingly disinterested while the news of our lives goes on below her. She has heard of the wedding of my daughter, Marinka’s first grandson’s birth, Bob’s bad back, our need for a new roof, my husband’s hernia surgery. She has hovered over us for years, breathing gentle wind above our over-the-fence meetings while we retrieve the mail or the morning paper and chat, as women all the world over do, talking of our lives and how we suffer, love, and hope. And mixing care and food together, to give us something from her heart, she bends down her generous branches that are heavy with round benedictions, whispers to us, “ Come. Here. Take my pears. Eat my ripening fruit.” As loving women all the world over do. Nancy Hofmann, Second Place, adult category

Worm Moon

Worm Moon
These are frost nights
And the downstairs bedroom
Never warms up
I can't slide out from under the covers
Without putting on my socks
When I throw back the curtains
And stand there blowing into my hands
I see that the light coming
Through the trees
Lies on the ground as pale as a shroud
But tonight is the Worm Moon
Which means that pretty soon
All the creatures
Coiled up in knots
Outside in the tangled roots
Will begin to stretch their
Tendrils, feelers and fingertips
Like blind eyes
Sensing a fire in the distance
Coming round again
To warm them up outside and in
Unwinding them like springs

John Pusey, First Place, adult category.