The July 29th Meeting Between the Grand Rapids Area Library and the Itasca County Board of Commissioners

Outgoing Library Director Will Richter and Grand Rapids Mayor Tasha Connelly were the primary speakers at Tuesday's Itasca County Commissioners board meeting.  They were there to answer Commissioners' questions about financials and the budget concerning the Grand Rapids Area Library, as well as to discuss a joint powers agreement between the city and the county regarding the library. 

Richter spoke to cuts and cost-saving efforts done by the library in an effort to balance the budget, such as utilizing volunteers and relying more on part time employees.  He brought up his transition to Zoning Administrator, and with his departure, the promotion of current Assistant Library Director Amy Dettmer to Library Director and the elimination of that assistant position as one of those cost saving measures.  Commissioner Johnson engaged a line of questioning regarding the two part time positions that were opened up to replace the soon-to-be vacant Assistant Director position.  His concern was the legacy cost down the road with additional career employees and its effect on the budget.  He further questioned the library's current financial issues, considering that there was a consistent positive revenue result in each annual operating report between 2012 and 2023.  The current Library Director explained that the strain stems from budget cuts or flattening from the Grand Rapids City Council.  Commissioner Venema also pointed out how Itasca County is not the entity cutting the library’s budget and he expressed his frustration with the misinformation regarding the issue floating all over social media.  With four libraries within his district, he plainly stated that if the library needs another half a million dollars from the county, the rest of the county needs to know and understand why. 

Commissioner Hopkins was not present during this meeting, resulting in the conversation ending in a stand-still, as the county can only have two representatives involved in a joint powers conversation.  Commissioner Snyder volunteered to be one of those representatives, but the other commissioners wanted to see if Commissioner Hopkins would like to continue taking point, otherwise commissioner Johnson was recommended as the second representative.