Cultural Plan 2013-2016 final.pdf - Coffs Harbour City Council ...

As adopted by Council on 28 February 2013
The State Library of NSW supplies standards for the comparative assessment of 21 aspects
of library management and facilities, such as size of collections, usage of holdings and size
of facilities. These are considered in relation to exemplary (best practice), enhanced (good)
and baseline (minimum acceptable) standards on a per head of population basis. Of the 20
standards for which information is available, the Coffs Harbour City Library is able to meet
just five of the minimum standards. 17
Three measures of particular concern are:
Standard Exemplary Enhanced Baseline Coffs Hbr
Library expenditure
per capita
$ 54.93 $ 46.46 $ 41.18 $ 22.62
Expenditure on
library materials per
capita (i.e. books
bought)
$ 5.47 $ 4.66 $ 4.14 $ 2.67
Visits to library per
capita
6.2 5.6 5.0 3.9
Very much less than the minimum standard is spent on the library than elsewhere in NSW
and unsurprisingly people in Coffs Harbour use the library less than other people in NSW.
Given the socio-economic situation of many residents, it is highly unlikely that they are
buying more books than elsewhere.
The Library also experiences significant restrictions with the size of its premises. 18 It
presents an extensive range of children’s activities including: weekly storytime sessions for
preschoolers, outreach storytime for special events and festivals, Ten Minutes a Day early
literacy program for parents, regular school holiday activities for children, Youth Week
activities and short story competitions and the Summer Reading Club for children. The
library also offers a home library service for housebound residents, a service for Book Clubs,
themed displays, and regular author talks and community information sessions.
17
Living Learning Libraries – Standards and Guidelines for NSW Public Libraries, State Library of NSW, 2011
18
The current size of the central library (including work areas) is 986 m2. State Library guidelines for a central
library commensurate with the Coffs Harbour population suggest that the appropriate size would be between
2,400 and 2600 square metres.
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