[Publib] Declining use of computers?

[Gair Helfrich]

Our use is climbing steadily. We have one location with 19 public PCs.
Generally at least 6-10 of them are busy in the AM but as soon as school
is out there's a waiting list for all 19 PCs. Sometimes the branch can't
fill the waiting list because there's just not enough PCs to go around.
We do use SAM as well, to limit the time each patron can have. Patrons
are now limited to 2 hours a day--in one hour sessions (earlier this
year we had half hour sessions but they have been done away with). They
cannot have a second session if there is a waiting list. This location
is in a poor, inner city community where many of the public do not have
a PC, let alone high speed access. We also have probably another 80 PCs
across the remainder of our branches and they are all generally busy in
the afternoon to early evening hours. To date this year we've had almost
14,000 sessions and our managers are begging for additional PCs.

Hope this helps,
Gair
  
__________
Gair Helfrich, MLS
Supervising Librarian
Information & Technical Services Manager
Atlantic County Library
40 Farragut Avenue
Mays Landing, NJ 08330
609-625-2776 ext. 6313  Fax: 609-625-8143
ghelfrich at aclsys.org

-----Original Message-----
From: publib-bounces at webjunction.org
[mailto:publib-bounces at webjunction.org] On Behalf Of Tracy Luscombe
Sent: Thursday, November 30, 2006 12:24 PM
To: publib at webjunction.org
Subject: [Publib] Declining use of computers?

 

Not around here. We added 9 computers to the lab last year, and bought
the pagers used in restaurants for people waiting their turn. Time
limits apply too. 

Tracy E. Luscombe
Genealogy Librarian
McKinney Memorial Public Library
101 E. Hunt Street
McKinney, TX 75069
972-547-7343
tluscombe at mckinneytexas.org 
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