Library seeks ways to save money

by Nathan Arneal
Published 7/9/25

The North Bend City Council began its July 1 meeting by getting an update on the public library from head librarian Amy Reznicek and library board president Chris Gross-Rhode.

The library continues to face budget problems as it eats away at its reserve funds.

Reznicek said that according to her research, the budget of the North Bend library is about $40,000 less than other Nebraska libraries in towns North Bend’s size.

She said the library is trying to save money in several ways, including having the library staff do the cleaning during their working hours, which saves about $5,000 a year. Reznicek also said she donates 5 to 10 hours a week while she cleans. City Clerk Theresa Busse said she should be writing down and getting paid for all her hours, to which Gross-Rhode agreed.

“I understand that,” Reznicek said, “but it’s really not in our budget at all.”

Busse also pointed out that all library staff is due another $1.50 raise Oct. 1 because of Nebraska’s minimum wage law.

Reznicek said the library could close the facility on Mondays to save money. Monday is the slowest day of the week, she said, though it is busy during the summer.

Reznicek said she and a group of other Dodge County librarians will be approaching the county board of supervisors for funding. She said other counties provide their libraries with money.

Active library cards are held by 988 people, Reznicek said. Of those, 506 card holders live within North Bend city limits, and 482 – representing about 100 households – are non-residents. She said those non-residents are frequent users of the library and its programs.

“The other day we had maybe 30 people at one of our summer reading programs and three were from in town,” Reznicek said.

Non-city residents do not contribute tax dollars to the operation of the library. Reznicek suggested charging non-residents $20 per household per year to use the library. She said charging non-residents a membership fee is quite common among libraries, and $20 seems to be an average price for libraries the size of North Bend.

“We are trying to be good stewards of our budget and the future of our library,” Reznicek said. “I’m going to be bold and ask for an increase in our budget.”

Councilman Alex Legge said any budget increase would have to come out of sales tax money, and the city recently committed half of its sales tax for the near future to pay off debt for the new sewer plant project. He said he would be hesitant to commit any sales tax money to the library until it is known what the treatment plant payments look like.

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