Assessing the Future of Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh: Pathways to Sustainability

Abstract

EDUCATIONThe RAND Corporation is a nonprofit research organization providing objective analysis and effective solutions that address the challenges facing the public and private sectors around the world. RAND's publications do not necessarily reflect the opinions of its research clients and sponsors. R ® is a registered trademark. PrefaceAs a publicly supported entity, Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh (CLP) is reliant, principally, on local sales tax dollars. As such, CLP is competing against an increasing number of regional assets for a fixed pool of local sales tax dollars. In this environment, CLP asked RAND to identify critical factors affecting the library's ability to obtain stable and adequate funding to meet its mission in the future. We developed a framework to understand how the factors connect to resources, which resulted in nine options, expressed as opportunities, for CLP to consider. With this information, the library, in concert with regional elected officials and funders, plans to create a process to evaluate opportunities to improve CLP's ability to secure the resources required to meet its mission in the future.This report should be of interest to those in Pittsburgh concerned about the future of CLP or that of any public library. It may also be of relevance to policymakers for libraries at the local level across the country.This research was conducted within RAND Education, a unit of the RAND Corporation. The mission of RAND Education is to bring accurate data and objective analysis to education policy. For three decades, RAND Education has helped identify and analyze the complex problems facing the nation's education system and has conducted complex, large-scale projects.