Drastic Consortium Budget Cut in SC

Academic libraries in South Carolina are scrambling as legislators have slashed state funding for PASCAL (Partnership Among South Carolina Academic Libraries), a consortium serving 58 colleges and universities statewide, from about $2 million to around $200,000 for the 2008-09 academic year. “Frankly, it's astonishing,” explained Mark Herring, dean of libraries at Winthrop University, Rock Hill, SC. “For every dollar the state spends, PASCAL delivers $7 in return access.”

Librarians from 35 PASCAL libraries attending the consortium's spring business meeting unanimously approved “a survival plan” and an operating budget that increased membership dues by 20 percent. They hope to have its funding restored and to cover partially the cost of the consortium's two major programs, electronic resource licenses and PASCAL Delivers, which, Herring said, makes “the state's 12 million volumes available to any student at any institution of higher learning in about 72 hours.”