With New York's public libraries facing a potential 10 percent budget cut, they're endanger of violating maintenance of effort (MOE) statutes, which could cost them federal and state aid. In response to this looming dilemma, Senator Hugh Farley, R-Niskayuna, has introduced a bill (SB 4102) on Friday that would allow waivers for some of these MOE statutes so libraries won't lose state aid.
He proposes letting the state Education Commissioner grant waivers so that local libraries don't jeopardize 25 percent of their state funding by failing to meet certain standards.
Farley's bill memorandum argues that this loss of funding would have a "crippling effect" and would impact persons who are disabled, speak English as a second language, are incarcerated, are institutionalized or unemployed. The memo suggests that the waiver process has a successful past.
It's not clear what standards libraries would be exempted from, but that they would be determined on a case by case basis.
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