Long Beach’s budget crunch could soon mean fewer library hours, fewer librarians, and less support for young people who rely on branches as safe, free community spaces.
To help address an expected $58 million gap, city officials are considering library reductions that would end Monday service at five of Long Beach’s 12 branches and eliminate 14 jobs, including the teen specialist role and a mental health associate, according to the Long Beach Post.
What’s happening?
In City Manager Tom Modica’s proposed budget, Bay Shore, Burnett, El Dorado, Harte, and Michelle Obama would each operate five days a week instead of six.
That would bring back Monday closures at those branches, even though city figures show that a little more than 1,000 people use them on Mondays, as reported by the Long Beach Post.
The same proposal trims staffing and other library spending: 14 positions would be cut, 11 of them occupied, along with funding for the pages who shelve books, security services, and most newspaper subscriptions in print and digital form.
Those changes together are expected to reduce library costs by slightly more than $1.4 million.
The timing is notable because library use is increasing rather than falling.
Long Beach’s 12 branches now average more than 2,800 visitors a day, up 8%, and programming is up 50%.
Why does it matter?
Beyond books, branches are places to get a library card, attend workshops, find research assistance, and join creative programs, staffed by people who know frequent visitors personally.
At Billie Jean King Library, librarian Elizabeth Cespuglio told the Long Beach Post that the loss of positions would further burden branches that are already thinly staffed.
The jobs on the chopping block support core operations such as checkouts, information desks, materials organization, and public programming.
One of the people affected is Jasmin Flores, working both in the system’s teen specialist role and as a mental health associate. Her work centers on young patrons facing challenges such as homelessness, past time in juvenile detention, food insecurity, or isolation.
“It honestly breaks my heart that I probably will not be in that position anymore,” Flores said.
What’s being done?
The proposal is already drawing opposition from residents, labor groups, and supporters of the library system.
Kristen Hernandez of the Long Beach Public Library Foundation said the nonprofit has collected more than 1,800 signatures on a petition opposing the cuts.
Labor is organizing, too.
Sashi Muralidharan, a labor representative with IAM Local 1930, said the union will “fight for every job” as it negotiates over the fallout from the proposed layoffs.
The library changes are part of a wider city plan that could result in layoffs of more than 260 workers and the elimination of more than 200 vacant positions.
According to the Long Beach Post, Mayor Rex Richardson has proposed restoring 70 of the positions marked for elimination.
After public hearings and the city’s online budget survey, the City Council must adopt a final budget by Oct. 1.
“Many have been laid off already,” city nurse and union negotiator Nate Kim told council members.
Hernandez warned that the stakes could extend beyond the reductions.
“In a city the size of Long Beach, and with our population, we could be seeing a 2027 where there are no libraries open on Monday,” she said. “I think that’s pretty crazy.”
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