Westlock County council approved a new fee schedule for the Westlock Municipal Library, which would substantially increase the rate for non-residents.
This means that once the Town of Westlock also approves the changes, Clyde residents will have to pay $75 per adult and $100 per family to use the library. Residents of the town and county pay $15 and $20 by comparison.
Reeve Charles Navratil said the change was necessary, since Clyde council has made clear it will not pay the approximately $11,000 annual fee that would be required for it to become a member municipality in the library.
“Until this motion is passed and the library board actually starts charging, the residents of Clyde are just coasting along,” he said. “If there’s 100 people out there in Clyde (who want to use the library) and those 100 people go to the next council meeting and demand that Clyde join the library board, we’ll probably get some action.”
The changes were approved, but not without opposition. Councillors Maureen Kubinec and Mike Cook voted against the increase.
Kubinec’s reasoning behind the decision is that county residents will not be charged extra to use the Westlock Rotary Spirit Centre, even though the county contributed no capital dollars to the project.
“This may be a little bit ironic, but the Town of Westlock chose not to charge a different fee for county residents for the use of the Spirit Centre, and this is kind of the same thing,” Kubinec said. “I won’t be supporting this.”
Cook expressed concern that by approving this fee structure, it could mean some lower-income residents are effectively prohibited from using the library, which he would not be fair to them.
“I’m having a hard time with the fact there might be a family there that maybe has a hard time, and their children might not have access to the library,” he said.
Other councillors suggested that while it’s true this might be a problem for lower-income Clyde residents, it’s the village’s responsibility to provide that service.
“Sometimes you just have to look at the virtues of common sense,” Coun. Don Savage said. “Clyde can’t have their cake and eat it too. If people want to belong to the library, I guess they’ll have to pay. People just have to accept it.”
Coun. Ron Zadunayski agreed, acknowledging it would be preferable for the village to buy into the system,
“That’s the way it should go, to me, but like Mike is saying there’s people who maybe can’t afford it,” he said. “Their children will be handicapped in their education. But that’s up to Clyde.”
Navratil said as far he was concerned, the issue here is that the library would lose out on provincial grants because Clyde declined to join, so it’s reasonable to charge a higher fee to non-residents to make up the difference.
He disagreed with Kubinec’s comparison to the Spirit Centre issue, suggesting recreation funding and library funding must be considered separately.
“I do not believe the town is not getting recreation money they could be getting because the county is not involved in the Spirit Centre,” he said. “The library is not getting funding; we are losing provincial grants for Clyde not joining the library.”
