Washington state public libraries

Another post commenting on Chapter 20 of Give Us a Dollar and We’ll Give You Back Four (2012-13)–now available as a $9.99 Kindle ebook or $21.95 paperback with ISBN 978-1481279161 on Amazon, along with the usual Lulu options. Note that Lulu prices for the paperback and hardback versions are now lower.

The 57 profiled libraries in Washington (state) (five were omitted) are mostly reasonably well supported, with two-thirds spending $36 or more (compared to 40% overall). Adjusted for Washington’s 104.3% cost of living, median benefit ratio is at least 4.03 in all spending brackets.

Circulation is low at the top but strong in the middle, with 58% circulating at least 10 items per capita (compared to 38% overall), and spending correlates with circulation. Patron visits are on the high side, with 47% reporting at least seven visits per capita (compared to 33% overall), while program attendance is slightly low and PC use is slightly high.

Libraries by legal service area

LSA Count % Outliers
<700 3 5.3% 1
700-1,149 3 5.3% 1
1,150-1,649 1 1.8% 1
1,650-2,249 3 5.3%
2,250-2,999 3 5.3%
3,000-3,999 1 1.8%
4,000-5,299 4 7.0% 1
6,800-8,699 2 3.5%
8,700-11,099 4 7.0%
11,100-14,099 2 3.5% 1
14,100-18,499 5 8.8%
18,500-24,999 2 3.5%
25,000-34,499 3 5.3%
34,500-53,999 4 7.0%
54,000-104,999 3 5.3%
105,000-4.1 mill. 14 24.6%

Circulation per capita and spending per capita

Circulation per capita correlates very strongly (0.86) with spending per capita.

Circulation per capita plotted against spending per capita

Circulation per capita (rounded) occurrence by spending category

Each circulation value appears on the horizontal axis, which is linear from 6 through 21, but not below or above. The graph is mostly useless.

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This work by Walt Crawford is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International

This entry was posted on Wednesday, March 27th, 2013 at 7:00 am and is filed under $4. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

2 Responses to “Washington state public libraries”

  1. Will Stuivenga says:
    April 10, 2013 at 9:15 am

    Walt will be speaking on this topic at the WLA/OLA Joint Conference in Vancouver, WA, on Thursday, April 25, at 4:00 p.m.. A special online report covering WA and OR libraries, derived from his book, will be available to attendees.

  2. Walt Crawford says:
    April 10, 2013 at 9:33 am

    That special online report is available now as a free PDF. Instructions to turn it into a nice printed booklet are here. Or you can buy a hardcover edition (casebound), also explained in that second link.