Hours of operation and staffing of city libraries have uncertain fates as Madison’s city organizations are beginning the process of determining which municipal functions are crucial and which are not in preparation for impending budget cuts.

Under Gov. Scott McCallum’s state budget repair bill, local library systems across the state could take huge cuts in funding. Madison’s public libraries are no exception.

“This is a huge hit for them,” Ald. Mike Verveer, District 4 said.

The $1.1 billion deficit comes at an especially hard time since an expansion is planned for the Lake View Branch Library and renovation of the Central Library on Mifflin Street is also pending.

Library Director Barbara Dimick said no cuts have been solidified yet, but the city is bracing itself.

“The issue is all fuzzy because we don’t know how [the budget crisis] is going to end up,” Dimick said.

While substantial city library cuts loom, UW-Madison Chancellor John Wiley is giving priority to university library funds. In an interview with The Badger Herald, Wiley said UW’s extensive research library system is almost untouchable.

“We’ve worked really hard over the last ten years to protect the library against cuts because library resources are so valuable and so important to almost everything we do,” Wiley said. “So it’s very unlikely we would go in and cut the library budget.”

Since UW students are employed throughout the library system and many students use the city’s libraries to study and research, substantial staff and hour cuts could adversely affect students.

“Since the library system runs such a lean, mean organization and makes do on the bare minimum, city employees will probably have to be laid off,” Verveer said.

Possible staff cuts will lead to a reduction in service hours the library offers.

“I don’t know how the library will function status quo with unfilled positions,” Verveer said.

Expansion for the Mifflin Street Library will most likely be halted, but the planning process will continue because the money was allocated through the 2001 budget.

The committee for the library system planning process was attempting to determine what was feasible for expansion of the library. Now with statewide budget cuts, any money put forth for construction will have to come from independent fundraisers.

The city had allocated funds for renovation of the Lakeview Library before the extent of the state’s budget deficit was uncovered. This means there could be problems with this year’s funding in some areas since the state’s budget does not begin till July and the city’s budget cycle started in January. Funding allocated for this year may even be completely stopped.

These cuts will also affect the performance of the libraries as a whole, but the extent to which miscellaneous services will falter has not been finalized.

“It is premature to know what effect the state budget crisis will have on the city,” Verveer said.

The governor has already put a hiring freeze on the all positions throughout city organizations. Even though the governor’s budget proposal has yet to pass through the legislature, municipalities are looking for ways to cut costs. This is being done so there is not a scramble to make cuts when a budget bill is finally decided on.

Yet whatever the final outcome of the budget crisis is, it will have a drastic effect on city organizations. They will no longer be able to perform services for the public at the quality level that they once did.

“I think it is unhealthy for the state of Wisconsin to drastically reduce the money to municipalities,” Dimick said. “You are going to have citizens without services.”