Joan Retsinas and Maureen Romans held a Zoom meeting on December 8 to rekindle interest in advocating for changes in the State library Funding formula and formulate an action plan. It was attended by Nancy Fritz, Anne Cohen, Judy Dorian, Rita Caraccia, Liz Head and Marie Hennedy.

The Action Plan needs every League member to contact their representatives and senators about the current outdated funding formula which allocates money based on a city’s or town’s local support for libraries. Thus, affluent cities and towns receive up to 10 times the per capita funding as the poorest cities. Complete information including the League’s position is found on www.lwvri.org under the Issues menu item.

The committee also plans to meet with the Speaker Shekarchi and members of the House leadership team as well as a member of the Senate leadership. In mid-December three committee members met with Providence Representative David Morales who suggested a study commission with a deadline to recommend changes to the current formula.

To help: contact Liz Head emhead603 [at] hotmail.com