The North Jefferson County Public Library District is going fine-free in 2022: Not only do overdue-item fines disproportionately affect low income people, research shows, but they also don’t work.
The district board voted at its Dec. 14 meeting to eliminate fines, and the board decided on Jan. 6 to forgive overdue fines that had been accrued by patrons prior to the policy change. The district’s libraries, located in Clancy and Montana City, previously charged 10 cents per overdue item per day upon the return of overdue items. In a news release, the board cited national studies that have shown that such fines “disproportionately affect children and other socio-economically disadvantaged groups while not actually affecting the overall return rate of library items.”
“The response from patrons I’ve talked to has been positive,” Clancy Librarian Jenny Eastvold said of the new fine-free policy.
District Director Carly Delsigne, who proposed eliminating fines, said in the news release that the board aims to “reduce stress, be more effective, and focus our time and energies on helping patrons,” and that library patrons already “overwhelmingly do the right thing” by turning their books in on time or nearly on time.
Delsigne also said in the news release that revenue from overdue fines was small and declining. Furthermore, Delsigne told The Monitor, although the libraries will no longer receive the small amount of money from overdue fines, they will also no longer have to spend staff time on processing overdue-item fines. She said that, based on national studies also cited in the release, she expects the policy will allow the libraries to serve more people and circulate more items, “so overall it should be a better and more effective use of our library funds.”
The libraries will continue to have due dates for items and overdue notices. Once an item is overdue, there will be a 45-day period in which patrons can return the items before they are charged a replacement fee. Just like before, patrons will have their library services suspended until overdue items are returned or a replacement fee is paid. Both the Clancy and Montana City libraries will continue to charge fees for lost or damaged items, or late returns on special checkouts, like interlibrary loans.
The Clancy and Montana City libraries are the latest in a growing number of libraries that have gotten rid of overdue-item fines. That includes the Boulder Community Library, as well as Helena’s Lewis & Clark County Library, which has been fine-free since 2015.
“I believe overdue fines in libraries should be abolished,” Boulder Community Library Aide Patrick Gustin said. Gustin worked in the North Jefferson County Public Library District until the end of last year. “Overdue fines punish people who can’t afford it and keep the people who need the library most from using it.”
Research for going fine-free originated in the 1970s, and the last few years have seen libraries and library systems across the country and in major cities like Chicago, Boston, New York, Baltimore, Salt Lake City and San Diego do away with fines for overdue items. The primary reason: Overwhelming research shows the lopsided impact of such fines.
The San Diego Public Library system got rid of overdue-item fines after a city study showed that over half the patrons that were blocked from accessing library services as a result of the fines were from the city’s two poorest neighborhoods. The American Library Association passed a resolution in January 2019 that recognized such fines as “a form of social inequity” and called on libraries nationwide to find a way to eliminate their fines.
Many library systems that eliminated fines saw a large influx of overdue books being returned once they got rid of overdue fines or when they offered amnesty periods in which overdue books were accepted without charging the accrued fines. An amnesty program in Chicago brought in 20,000 overdue items, one in Los Angeles brought in nearly 65,000, and one in San Francisco brought in almost 700,000, according to a report published in Library Journal.
After the Chicago Public Library eliminated its overdue fine policy, it saw thousands of patrons that previously had overdue fines apply for library cards, and saw more books checked out than before.
