The fact is, in the age of the internet and Amazon, no one 'needs' a small town library anymore. What this town, and many others, need, is a community center, something that can be accomplished, I suspect, for far less than the cost of the proposed library.

If residents can't afford the $35-a-year increase in their property taxes (to quote one figure provided in the article), how could they afford to purchase every book they wanted to read? Especially families with children? A good library can serve both as a gateway to learning and also as an effective community center.

Supporters of the proposed library in Shutesbury are attempting to raise funding for the library privately in the hope that new library can be built acccording to their plans even if no further local tax money is approved. They have twice lost a town vote to fund the library, and are now taking the matter to court to seek a reversal of the second election in which further funding was denied by a majority of voters. It sounds like Super-PAC to me - if you have enough money, then you can do whatever you want.I am a resident of Shutesbury and I oppose the building of this library for ecological reasons. "Reduce, reuse, recycle" tells me that when a town has unused municipal building space and its population is shrinking, building a $4,000,000.00, including interest, library for a town of 1800 people does not meet the standard. We have a magnificent elementary school library about a mile from the proposed new library site. This 2000 square foot library contains 11,000 books and over twenty desk-top Apple computers - for 133 students!  Let's make this resource available throughout the day! Of course the present little library continues to serve the people of Shutesbury, as it has done for over 100 years.Do you know of a location where building a library might make a difference between the children there learning to read or not? If so, perhaps that place could use your donation. 

If the supporters should get the money to get the library built, they will have to continue to go to the town to support it. Newbury, MA built a new building about ten years ago that has never received support from the community at large. It is only open three days a week and constantly faces desertification. Libraries are a great equalizer for providing information to everyone. Not everyone is privileged to have electronic resources at their finger tips, nor money for books and newspapers. The promotion of literacy should be an essential responsibility for our communities and the ultitmate goal to make it available to everyone.