Inner and Inter Library Loan Difference

Here is the letter that I am sending to the City Council. So much misinformation swirling around about this issue.




August 30, 2010

Dear Council Members:

Please take a few minutes to education yourself on the difference between an Inner-Library loan and an Inter-Library loan. It was clear that during the Public Hearing on August 24, 2010 it appeared that Darren Hernandez was grossly misinformed about the difference and therefore misinformed you.

General Definitions:
1) Inner-Library loans are loans between one branch library and another. Since the items are owned by a single library system, use one catalog and have the same borrowing policies procedures requesting and delivery are generally streamlined. An example here would be a book in the Canyon Country Library is wanted by a patron in the Valencia Library. Patrons are usually able to request items been branches seamlessly and on their own.
2) Inter-Library loans are loans between two different library systems. The items are not owned by the lending library and must be acquired from a other system. The catalogs are not shared between the libraries; the two systems my have different lending policies; requests are usually handled by library staff; and delivery is generally handled by the US mail. An example here would be the new Santa Clarita System wants an item owned by the County of Los Angeles System which is part of the South State Cooperative.

Lending Periods:
1) Inner-Library loans are governed by the policies of the unified system. Patrons usually have renewals if no one is waiting for the item, a standard loan period for the type of item, and a standard overdue fee rate set by the system.
2) Inter-Library loans are governed by the agreement between the two individual systems. Usually there are no renewal of items, the overdue fees may be different and the lending periods may be different for items obtained from different systems because the agreements are different.

What Gets Lent:
1) Inner-Library loans are generally comprehensive. What is owned by the system as a whole is available to all the card holders in that system no matter which branch owns the items. There may be a formula for priority on branch-owned items for branch vs. non-branch users for items in high demand. Video, Audio, best-sellers, and other items will be sent out within the system.
2) Inter-Library loans are highly depended on the system that owns the items and their own policies for lending items to other outside systems. Generally best-sellers and newly published items are not sent out on Inter-library loan. Always the owning system will give priority to their own patrons before sending an item out to an outside system. Some systems do not lend out audio or video.


Right to Refusal:
1) For inner-library loans a branch usually does not have the right to refuse to send an item requested by a patron of another branch. For example if someone at the Canyon Country Library wants an item from Valencia Library and it is available, the patron can be assured that the item will arrive shortly at the Canyon Country Library.
2) For inner-library loans a system has the right to refuse to send a requested item out to the patron at an outside system library. For example, if a Valencia patron in the newly formed Santa Clarita Library system wants an item owned by the County of Los Angeles System, the County has the right to refuse sending the item, therefore the patron cannot be assured that the item will arrive in a timely manner or at all. The Inter-Library Loan Personnel may have to approach several libraries for the requested item before finding a library willing or able to loan the item out.

Lending, Requesting Limits and Fees
1) Inner-library loans are governed by the internal policies of the library system. A system may or may not charge fees for picking up requested items or they may be levied fees for not picking up requested items. However, the system is uniform.
2) Intra-library loans are governed by the policies of the owning library and not requesting library. The requesting system may choose to subsidize fees so that they are uniform on the surface for the customer. However, library systems generally do charge the customer some fees and/or set strict limits due to the volume of paperwork involved, tracking required, and submitting the information to the state for reimbursement from the Public Library Fund to defer costs. The Public Library Fund by the way has been hacked away and hacked away by the State and has rarely been fully funded.

Please feel free to contact me if you have any further questions or need more information on the difference between Inner-Library loans and Inter-Library loans. That one small letter actually makes a pretty big difference.