Libraries are cutting back on staff and services after Trump's order to dismantle small agency

Boston Globe

18-05-2025

E-book and audiobook programs are especially vulnerable to budget cuts, even though those offerings have exploded in popularity since the COVID-19 pandemic.
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'I think everyone should know the cost of providing digital sources is too expensive for most libraries,' said Cindy Hohl, president of the American Library Association. 'It's a continuous and growing need.'
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President Trump issued an executive order March 14 to dismantle the IMLS before firing nearly all of its employees.
One month later, the Maine State Library announced it was issuing layoff notices for workers funded through an IMLS grant program.
'It came as quite a surprise to all of us,' said Spencer Davis, a library generalist at the Maine State Library who is one of eight employees who were laid off May 8 because of the suspended funding.
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In April, California, Washington, and Connecticut were the only three states to receive letters stating the remainder of their funding for the year was canceled, Hohl said. For others, the money hasn't been distributed yet. The three states all filed formal objections with the IMLS.
Rebecca Wendt, California state library director, said she was never told why California's funding was terminated while the other remaining states did not receive the same notice.
'We are mystified,' Wendt said.
The agency did not respond to an email seeking comment.
Most libraries are funded by city and county governments but receive a smaller portion of their budget from their state libraries, which receive federal dollars every year to help pay for summer reading programs, interlibrary loan services, and digital books. Libraries in rural areas rely on federal grants more than those in cities.
Many states use the funding to pay for e-books and audiobooks, which are increasingly popular, and costly, offerings. In 2023, more than 660 million people globally borrowed e-books, audiobooks, and digital magazines, up from 19 percent in 2022, according to OverDrive, the main distributor of digital content for libraries and schools.
In Mississippi, the state library helped fund its statewide e-book program.
For a few days, Erin Busbea was the bearer of bad news for readers at her Mississippi library: Hoopla, a popular app to check out e-books and audiobooks had been suspended indefinitely in Lowndes and DeSoto counties due to the funding freeze.
'People have been calling and asking, 'Why can't I access my books on Hoopla?'' said Busbea, library director of the Columbus-Lowndes Public Library System in Columbus, a majority-Black city northeast of Jackson.
The library system also had to pause parts of its interlibrary loan system allowing readers to borrow books from other states when they aren't available locally.
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'For most libraries that were using federal dollars, they had to curtail those activities,' said Hulen Bivins, the Mississippi Library Commission executive director.
The funding freeze came after the agency's roughly 70 staff members were placed on administrative leave in March.
Attorneys general in 21 states and the American Library Association have filed lawsuits against the Trump administration for seeking to dismantle the agency.
The institute's annual budget is below $300 million and distributes less than half of that to state libraries across the country. In California, the state library was notified that about 20 percent, or $3 million, of its $15 million grant had been terminated.
'The small library systems are not able to pay for the e-books themselves,' said Wendt, the California state librarian.
In South Dakota, the state's interlibrary loan program is on hold, according to Nancy Van Der Weide, a spokesperson for the South Dakota Department of Education.
The institute, founded in 1996 by a Republican-controlled Congress, also supports a national library training program named after former first lady Laura Bush that seeks to recruit and train librarians from diverse or underrepresented backgrounds. A spokesperson for Bush did not return a request seeking comment.
'Library funding is never robust. It's always a point of discussion. It's always something you need to advocate for,' said Liz Doucett, library director at Curtis Memorial Library in Brunswick, Maine. 'It's adding to just general anxiety.'