Public Library Circulation, Anonymized Patron Access Records, and Budget Information

To Whom It May Concern:

Pursuant to the New York Freedom of Information Law, I hereby request the following records:

1. Total circulation of library materials (broken down by material type) for 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019. Please provide these as aggregated monthly totals for 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019. If possible please include the following details:

-Total physical item circulation (delineated by first time check-outs versus renewals)
-Total number of circulations of electronic materials
-Total circulation
-Electronic Content Use
-Total Collection Use

2. Lost library items aggregated monthly for 2016, 2017, 2018, and 2019.

3. Patron circulation records including material due dates and material return dates for 2016, 2017, 2018, and 2019. If possible, please provide these as hashed (de-identified but with unique key per patron).

4. Annual itemized library budget 2016, 2017, 2018, and 2019 including any donations made to the library. Please provide a record of donations collected aggregated monthly for these years. Please also provide a description of how donations are solicited.

5. The total revenue of fines and total revenue of fees collected 2016, 2017, 2018, and 2019.

6. The current library policy on fines and fees and the date this policy took effect as well as dates of changes to the policy between 2016 and today.

7. The definition (if any) your library uses for "active borrower".

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This request is part of a research project by the Information School at the University of Washington to better understand how removal of library fines affects library circulation, patron visits, and library budgets. We are committed to open access and plan to make our findings broadly available to the public. If fees cannot be waived please inform us in advance.

We ask that, if possible, you please respond via email with data files in machine-readable format (examples include .csv, .txt., .xls/x) or if applicable text documents or clear, high-quality scanned PDFs. If you cannot reply electronically, please mail us the best quality copies you reasonably can. Your efforts help us ensure broad accessibility and equity.

The requested documents will be made available to the general public, and this request is not being made for commercial purposes.

In the event that there are fees, I would be grateful if you would inform me of the total charges in advance of fulfilling my request. I would prefer the request filled electronically, by e-mail attachment if available or CD-ROM if not.

Thank you in advance for your anticipated cooperation in this matter. I look forward to receiving your response to this request within 5 business days, as the statute requires.

Sincerely,

Bree Norlander

Dear Rosemary,

Thank you for your response. We do not have a budget to pay for public records requests. It was our understanding that as an educational institution, seeking information for a scholarly purpose and not for commercial use, we would be exempt from fees. If it is not possible to obtain this information without cost, we will have to cancel the request.

Sincerely,
Bree Norlander
Research Analyst & Coordinator
University of Washington Information School
norlab@uw.edu

Dear Rosemary,

Thank you for your correspondence and consideration. We have withdrawn this request. Please do not feel compelled to respond during the closure of your library. If and when your library reopens and you have time we would very much appreciate receiving any data that you've compiled. We also did not mean for the Public Record Request to be adversarial - we simply saw this as the route to most efficiently request information from a variety of public agencies. We apologize for any undue work or inconvenience this caused.

Take care,
Dr. Nicholas Weber, nmweber@uw.edu
Bree Norlander, norlab@uw.edu
University of Washington Information School