The People Want To Read: On Massive Budget Cuts Proposed in Chicago
If passed, Chicago Public Library will lose half their budget for acquiring new books and materials.
The Chicago Public Library (CPL), like so many libraries nationwide, has its budget on the chopping block. These proposed cuts come at a time when more people need to turn to their public libraries not only for crucial social services and information resources but also for personal enjoyment.+
CPL’s 2026 budget cuts are brutal. Ninety positions, both full time and hourly, would be eliminated across the system. Half of the full time positions would be at the Librarian II level; an additional 11 positions would be cut between the Librarian III and Librarian IV levels. Such cuts suggest a lack of interest in growing professional talent, as these roles are both stepping stones to and positions within management. They represent positions fulfilled by librarians with experience and knowledge in the field and with the library system and community itself.
Hourly positions, most of which are not professional librarian roles, are taking significant hits as well. Despite not being “professional” roles, these positions are crucial to the everyday operations of any library. Clerks, associates, and pages are those most often behind the scenes ensuring that materials are being processed for use, that materials are being repaired when the need arises, and putting the materials on shelves.
Not only is staffing at Chicago Public Libraries to be cut. So, too, is the materials budget.
Fully half of the budget for acquiring new books and materials could be cut. CPL currently has $10 million to spend on books and materials. The 2026 budget leaves them with $5 million.
Meanwhile, the Chicago Police Department is poised to see an increase in their budget for 2026, alongside some restrictions related to their habitual overtime spending. The Police regularly overspend their budget allocation.*
It’s hard not to see this proposed series of cuts alongside the increased price of materials and services–digital collections and streaming services are rising as astronomical rates while also meeting astronomical demand and those materials were already more costly to libraries than to consumers–as anything short of cruel. It’s hard not to wonder why it is the library shouldering the burden of not only providing a social safety net in the city but that that same library needs to then shoulder the burden of such tremendous cuts. Chicago Public Library budgets have remained flat for years, despite rising costs, rising inflation, and rising needs.
Libraries are not only the services they provide, many of which have been added with the shuttering of other publicly-funded social goods from municipalities over the last several decades (usually without additional training or funding). Libraries are also the books, movies, audiobooks, and databases they have.++ Chicago Public Library is among the public libraries in the US which calls itself a book sanctuary–a space where books are protected from censorship and where accessibility to inclusive material is championed.
What makes these potential cuts even more worrysome is that historically, CPL management hasn’t advocated on behalf of the libraries or patrons in city negotiations. The Chicago Public Library Employees Union notes:
We know from past budget hearings that CPL management will not advocate for our patrons and ask City Council and the Mayor to adequately fund and staff our libraries, despite the consequences. Our City Council members, meanwhile, may be tempted to cave to business interests, even though it will mean worse services and resources for library patrons. Our city and our libraries desperately need new, progressive sources of revenue, and we don’t want to see our patrons’, friends’, and neighbors’ households bearing the brunt of those increases–which is likely to happen if big businesses don’t pay their fair share.
Just two hours up the lakeshore from Chicago, Milwaukee city leaders also put budget cuts on the table for the Milwaukee Public Library. But then leadership did something different. After listening to citizen input on the budget, the alderman chairing the finance committee advocated for adding more library hours in because libraries are necessary.
This week, Carolyn Ciesla, librarian and Chicago resident, penned a letter to city leaders that contextualizes the brutality of the budget proposal. It’s powerful, nuanced, and an example of not only how Chicagoans can and should address these cuts, but also how people across the US seeing their libraries impacted by budget cuts can respond.
Dear Mayor Johnson and Chicago Alderpeople:
I’m writing to address the Chicago Public Library budget cuts in next year’s proposed city budget. I live in Chicago and have been a resident for 13 years. I am also a librarian.I want to thank Mayor Johnson for recognizing the impact and importance of libraries, especially now as we see ever-increasing attempts at book bans and subversive attempts at limiting access to knowledge and information.
However, I am writing because I am extremely concerned about the proposed budget for next year. Collection funding for the library is cut in half, reduced by $5 million. Looking at the overall city budget, $5 million is a drop in the bucket; however, it makes a world of difference to library patrons. This budget reduction comes at the same time that publishers are increasing the cost of e-books and federal tariffs have increased the price of printing costs for physical books. This means that Chicago public library users will not get materials they want, and could mean a reduction in the use of libraries overall across the city.
Libraries function as third spaces, a place for people to go at zero cost in order to gather, to learn, and to grow. However, it is clear that what drives people to Chicago public libraries are the materials they want to check out. Circulation rates since 2022 have increased by 17.5%. The data bear it out: libraries provide the materials that people want and that people need.
Not only does the budget reduction come at the same time that costs are increasing for the very materials that this budget would purchase, it also comes as CPL prepares to open its 82nd branch. Additionally, the proposed budget has quietly eliminated 89 positions, essentially forcing CPL staff to do more with less. And I have no doubt that CPL staff will rise to the occasion, serving their patrons in the best possible way they are able, but this will add strain to a staff already operating at full capacity. As CPL staff continue to do more with less while trying to reduce any impact on patrons, I fear these significant losses will only be compounded.
Not only is $5 million not enough to support all of the collection materials that Chicago wants and needs, it doesn’t even begin to stand up to peer institutions across the country. I was distressed to learn that when comparing CPL collection budgets to other large urban libraries across the nation, we rank near the bottom in what we invest into our collections, even at current funding levels. Among the nine largest library systems serving populations of over 2M residents, CPL ranks second lowest in terms of spending per resident. The Illinois Library Association Standards recommend that all public libraries maintain a collection budget that is between 8-12% of their operating budget. With this cut, Chicago Public Library will only spend 5.6% of its operating budget on collection - well below the minimum standard recommended in our industry. These cuts will result in extremely long wait times for materials, and in some cases will deny access to materials that people need.
Exacerbating all of this is the fact that literacy rates are declining across the country, and we’re seeing it sharply in younger people. According to the National Assessment of Educational Progress, one-third of 12th graders did not meet basic reading requirements. Within Chicago, in 2024, only 22% of 11th graders read at grade level, less than a third. Most striking are the gaps we see in literacy with low-income students and students of color. Between 3rd and 8th grade, 23% of low-income students, 25.5% of Hispanic students and 22.6% of Black students met the proficiency goals.
Access to library materials is a lifeline for Chicago residents. I am proud of my home library/Chicago Public Library for the incredible impact it has in our community each day - for our seniors, our toddlers, and for everyone in between. I believe that here in Chicago, where we value education for all and investment in our communities, we should be leaders in investing in our public libraries - not failing to meet minimum standards. We can do better.
Please reconsider the budget cuts to the Chicago Public Library. Let’s invest in our residents, in our library patrons, in our learners and innovators and in our future.
The proposed budget for the Chicago Public Library isn’t a done deal yet. There are numerous ways to help get the budget for the city’s 81 libraries serving 77 neighborhoods restored to at least 2025 levels.
Chicago Residents:
Write the alderperson both representing your home and your work place. You can find out who those people are here. AFSCME suggests that you tell them to vote yes on new revenue and no on the slashes to the library’s budget. Use the talking points here and in Ciesla’s letter, as well as your own perspective on why the library budget needs to be reinstated. You can see more talking points here, though note many are more applicable to CPL employees.
At least one Alderperson, Samantha Nugent, has written an excellent opinion piece in one of Chicago’s major newspapers about the devastation these budget cuts would cause. Use this letter as support and as justification when you reach out to your own representation.
The Chicago Public Library Employee Union has made it very easy for you to simply sign on to this letter that will go to the mayor, your alderperson, and the library commissioner, Chris Brown.
Find your local branch’s Friends group and/or other local library advocacy group and get involved. Here’s the one for Rogers Park.
USE your library. If you haven’t been to a branch in a while, show up and exercise your library card. If you can’t go in person, check out some databases or online resources.
If you haven’t written the Chicago Public Library’s Board of Directors lately, it’s time. Tell them what value the library holds and why it matters so much to the city and its residents. This will not solve the budget issue on its own, but it will provide further documentation about the importance of system.
Non-Chicago Residents:
Spread the word to any and everyone you know who may be a Chicago resident. They may be completely unaware of what’s at stake.
Ensure your own community’s library is being fully funded. Do this by looking up what the funding levels are now–it’s often on city or county websites, if not on the library’s page itself–and then spending a few minutes writing to the board of our library in support of the work being done. Put it on your personal calendar or agenda to send such letters regularly, and if you can, show up to board meetings in person and speak up about the library in public comments. Being pro-active is more important than being reactive.
For some further reading, check out coverage from Block Club Chicago, WBEZ, and Fox 32 Chicago.
Notes:
+During the beginning of COVID, Chicago Public Library was one of the last major city library systems to close and move to virtual services and to become one of the first to reopen.
*As AFSCME’s local library union notes, there are really good, progressive things in this budget, too. The library should be up there with those new taxes.
++A long-time pet peeve of mine is hearing over and over that libraries are more than books. That’s not wrong, but it also allows an easy devaluing of the books that are the bread and butter of libraries. The more you say something as justification for, say, budget stability or increase, the more opportunity there is for those with the purse strings to say your most basic provisions are not necessary then. The perpetual line from book banners’ mouths is that they’re not banning books because you can just buy them elsewhere. Do not let that be the narrative perpetuated by library advocates–no, in fact, many people cannot “just” buy the materials. Libraries offer essential access people do not have and that, in a period of costs outpacing salaries and federal government hamstringing financial support to those who need it, will begin to impact greater and great numbers of people.