The Owen Sound and North Grey Union Public Library will close on Friday evenings starting in May.
The library is currently open until 9 PM on weeknights, but Friday closings will change to 5 PM, coinciding with closings on Saturdays and Sundays.
The move was proposed by the library board as a cost-saving measure and it was accepted by city council at pre-budget deliberations yesterday.
Library CEO Cindy Weir says the board accepts that hard decisions have to be made in tough financial times, and closing on Friday evenings makes the most sense because that’s when library patronage is at its lowest level.
Owen Sound Mayor Deb Haswell says council appreciates the support of the board in making this move.
It was among several decisions made by council on Friday that whittled a proposed municipal tax increase from 6.19 per cent to 5.46 per cent.
Both numbers are down from a 7.64 per cent increase with which council began deliberations in January.
And the number arrived at on Friday, while not final, is already better than last year’s municipal tax hike of 5.81 per cent.
But it hasn’t come easy
Staff had a capital budget wish list in January that would have required taxation funding of more than four million dollars but that figure has been whittled to 1.4 million.
It means a number of projects will be deferred for at least one year.
Transit revenue is also expected to go up, as council approved an increase in fares in all categories by 25 cents.
A proposed 50-cent increase was not approved by council, and neither was a five dollar increase in passes.
Staff will continue other possible user fee increases between now and the next budget talks on March 23 and 24.
Haswell says this will help council to trim the current proposed tax hike even further.