Some more stats to develop the discussion. The St. Paul library system may get about $3.3 million less than the Minneapolis library system from property taxes (numbers from previous post) but per capita spending is about the same for both cities:
ST PAUL Population 287,151 $9.8 Million Property Taxes or $34.13 per capita 13 locations MINNEAPOLIS Population 382,618 $13.1 Million Property Taxes or $34.24 per capita 15 locations One branch per 22,088 persons in St. Paul. One branch per 25,508 persons in Minneapolis >From the Mpls. Library Website: -Registered Borrowers: 328,665 -Collection Over 3 Million Items "In 2003, for each person in Minneapolis, we provided 8.14 books, checked out 6.23 items, answered 3.18 questions, and purchased $5.08 worth of new books, media, electronic resources, and other library materials" Dave Harvey CARAG ----- Original Message ----- From: "Mark Snyder" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: "Minneapolis Issues Forum" <[email protected]> Sent: Tuesday, August 23, 2005 10:09 PM Subject: [Mpls] the trouble with percentages > I don't want to specifically pick on Samantha because she's hardly the first > person to make this mistake, nor will she likely be the last. > > It's generally not a good idea to rely solely on percentages when talking > about budgets because when you rely solely on percentages, you fail to take > into account a key point, which is the percentage of what total number? > > For example: > > Minneapolis 2005 property tax revenues are reportedly $187 million > > 7% of $187M is $13.1 million > > St. Paul 2005 property tax revenues are reportedly $61 million > > 16% of $61 million is $9.8 million, which would mean that the St. Paul > Library system gets about $3.3 million less than the Minneapolis Public > Library system gets from Minneapolis property taxes. > > Which suggests some questions for making a fairer comparison: > > How many library facilities does St. Paul have compared to Minneapolis? > > How many visitors does each system have? > > If these were equal (and I'm pretty sure they're not) then one could then > ask why St. Paul was able to keep their libraries open for more hours with > less money. But since they're most likely not equal, we have to account for > how much larger is the Minneapolis system and how many more people does it > serve. > > Then we can start talking about what the Minneapolis Public Library system > deserves and how we can/should pay for it. > > Personally, I'm a fan of that campaign that was going on a few years ago > where somebody figured out it would cost us $12 each to fully fund the MPL > (I hope I'm remembering that correctly). That was what prompted (guilted?) > me to become a Friend of the MPL. > > Mark Snyder > Windom Park > REMINDERS: 1. Be civil! Please read the NEW RULES at http://www.e-democracy.org/rules. If you think a member is in violation, contact the list manager at [EMAIL PROTECTED] before continuing it on the list. 2. Don't feed the troll! Ignore obvious flame-bait. For state and national discussions see: http://e-democracy.org/discuss.html For external forums, see: http://e-democracy.org/mninteract ________________________________ Minneapolis Issues Forum - A Civil City-focused Civic Discussion - Mn E-Democracy Post messages to: mailto:[email protected] Subscribe, Un-subscribe, etc. at: http://e-democracy.org/mpls
