EMO – The Township of Emo has not increased its funding to the Emo Public Library since 2018, and the mayor says he’s not sure if it will this year.
“All I can say is, it hasn’t come before council yet,” Mayor Harold McQuaker said in an interview.
“It’s something that we’ve talked about, something that we will discuss in council,” he continued. “Then we’ll see where it goes from there.”
When asked if he would like to see a funding increase, McQuaker said he will wait to see how the township’s four other council members feel about it.
“We’re doing our best and so we’ll see what happens,” he said.
“But I do want to keep our library open.”
Library finances came to the foreground of public discussion within the community of 1,200 last November when librarian Nick Donaldson posted an open letter on Facebook warning that, without a significant amount in donations, the library would have to close for the last weeks of 2023.
The library will be asking for more money from Emo this year, but how much more is yet to be determined, Donaldson said in an interview.
The library likely will seek funding increases from the La Vallee and Chapple townships as well, he added.
Municipalities also transfer the full amounts they receive from the Provincial Library Operating Grant (PLOG) program, but that funding hasn’t increased in over 20 years, he said.
The Emo library receives about $4,000 annually in PLOG money transferred over from Emo, La Vallee and Chapple, he said.
The Township of Emo’s annual funding (not including PLOG) to the Emo Public Library increased by $3,000 in 2018, the year McQuaker was elected mayor, to $46,500. It has not increased since then.
Municipal levies for the library come from three other townships. La Vallee contributed $4,546 in 2023, almost 75 per cent more than in 2018. Chapple added $3,980 to the library kitty, more than double its 2018 amount. Morley, which has a primary agreement with Rainy River’s library, has kept its annual levy to the Emo library steady at $600.
