BROOKINGS — As with any annual budget put forth by a government, there are winners and there are losers.

In South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem’s budget for fiscal year 2026, one of the losers would be the South Dakota State Library — it would be eliminated, with its staff of 12 and $2 million in state and federal funding. That elimination would be felt by public libraries across the state.

To get a feel for the pain if this budget proposal passes, The Brookings Register sat down for a chat with Brookings Public Library Director Ashia Gustafson.

“As everyone knows, we have our lovely Libby app owned by a company called ‘Overdrive,’” the director explained. “Libby allows library patrons to use their electronic devices, e.g. a smartphone or tablet, to check out e-books and audio books. South Dakota has a consortium, so the majority of South Dakota’s public libraries get Libby from the state library.

“The state library brokered a contract with Overdrive that allows public libraries access to Libby. That contract would go away and with it access to Libby. For Brookings then, we’d have to up our budget somewhere. If you cover the city budget, you know that is pretty tight.”

The other service the state library provides for South Dakota libraries is the Statewide Interlibrary Loan System. “They pay for the courier system, the company that drives the books all across the state,” Gustafson added. “We use software called South Dakota Share-It that allows for the request of books all over the state.

“Interlibrary loan would become a much longer process. Libraries would have to mail books across the state instead of using the courier system. Library postage rates are now going to go up and there’s not budgeting for that much more postage.

“And it’s going to take longer than the two weeks it now takes to get books. The library sending the book out would pay the postage.”

City pick up the slack?

In 2023 the Brookings Public Library sent out more than 1,600 books to other public libraries across the state via the interlibrary loan system. Bottom line: Gustafson explained that if the interlibrary loan system as it is goes away, “It would be more difficult. It would up our postage budget and then we would probably be more selective in what we do send out or how often. We’d also run into budgetary issues, with more postage than what we’re budgeted for.”

While the state library gets federal and state funding, the Brookings Public Library does not. In a best-case scenario, the city of Brookings would pick up the slack and cover the funding shortfall.

However, the director stated, “The city’s budget for 2025 has been finalized. So whenever that impact hits, if those budget cuts were to go through as proposed, we wouldn’t be able to pick up that slack until 2026.”

“The South Dakota Library Association, the SDLA, is working to get the word out to all of the South Dakota libraries as to how this would impact everybody," Gustafson said. SDLA members include school, academic and public librarians in the state.

She noted that local activities will not be affected: So parents and their offspring can look to the return of the Zoo Man-Brent Mielke and a collection of slithery non-poisonous critters, such as a python.

Contact John Kubal at jkubal@brookingsregister.com.