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Weyburn read-in event draws over 200 people

Grassroots event in 78 locations to support libraries
Library read-in

By Greg Nikkel
The province-wide grassroots reading event, DEAR (or Drop Everything and Read), held on Friday, saw large turnouts of between 100 to 200 people at each location, including around 200 in Weyburn at MLA Dustin Duncan’s constituency office on Fourth Street.
The event was organized in support of public libraries after the provincial government slashed the budget for regional libraries by 58 per cent retroactive to January 1, in addition to other initiatives such as a large online petition and petition forms being circulated at libraries to try and get the government to change its mind on the cuts.
“I was thrilled to see all the people,” said Lesley Richards, one of the main instigators of this campaign in Weyburn. Provincially, it was estimated around 5,800 people came out to 78 locations around the province, with attendance ranging from as small as nine up to 350 at one event.
“My goal was around 100, so to have double that was amazing,” she said, noting she also saw representatives from out of town at Weyburn’s event, such as from Lake Alma and Radville. “I hope this will send a loud message that we love our libraries.”
There were a number of people with signs at the event, with messages such as “Save Our Libraries”, and one with a Harry Potter reference, “Even Voldemort Respected Libraries”.
A mother, Lana Walliser, and her young son Ryker held a sign that read “I love story hour”. Her sister, Jill Zyla, had a message on her son Lachlan’s T-shirt that read, “Mr. Morgan, I can’t go to story hour online.”
A group of three residents had an hour-long visit with MLA Duncan inside his office during the read-in event, including Brenda King, and Brian and Ellen Pegg, and they pressed their case for saving libraries with Duncan, who is the minister of Energy and Resources.
“I think he was a very good listener,” said King. “We all had a number of points about how important libraries are, and the inter-library system is. It’s not just important for Weyburn, but for the little towns to keep their libraries.”
Ellen Pegg said she feels the minister, Don Morgan, is either misreading the information about libraries, or has had facts misrepresented to him, based on some of the comments he’s made about the cuts to the libraries.
“We tried making the point that regional libraries give us the economy of scale. If we have to go back to individual libraries, we won’t be able to have services like Hoopla. They’re trying to download a lot of this onto municipalities,” said Pegg, who broke down the cost to only being two cents per person per day, when it’s divided amongst all Saskatchewan residents, or about $6 per person for a year.
“So a number of us are really perplexed by this,” she added. “We didn’t have a lot of time, because the government hit us with no consultations.”
Duncan “was very kind and very patient, and he listened very well,” said Pegg. “He tried to make a few points, but there were three of us trying to make points as well. We impressed on him that he needs to take this to cabinet and advocate for us.”
Among some of the other points they made, said Pegg, was an answer to some of minister Morgan’s comments, such as that there are too many libraries. She noted that the City of Calgary, which has a population of 1.2 million people, has 18 libraries. The reason Saskatchewan, with a population of only 1.1 million, has the number of libraries they do is because the communities are spread out over a large area.
Pegg pointed out that none of the group are employees of the library or are members of any political party, such as the opposition, but are “ardent supporters of the library system” and were very grateful that Duncan gave them time to listen to them.