University of Texas School of Law - Peregrinus Yearbook (Austin, TX)

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AROUND TOWNES 1990 PEREGRINUS TROUBLED TIMES FOR THE LIBRARY The University’s Board of Regents recently approved a $7 increase in the law school tuition per credit hour to directly benefit the Tartlton Law Library. The tuition increase took effect in summer 1990 but the future for the library’s funding is still uncertain. Tarlton's Associate Director of Research, Gary Hartman, termed the library's situation as an emergency” and thinks the Texas Legislature will have to provide the ultimate answer by further appropriations. Tarlton is the nation's fifth-largest law library in terms of volumes held, but promises to fall if current trends continue. In a 1988 survey at the 175 ABA-approved law schools, Tarlton ranked only 25th in irs annual book budget and 30th in by Michael O. Whitmire volumes added for the previous year. The library has held similarly weak rankings in other areas for several years. Guy Wellborn, an Associate Dean of the School of Law, acknowledged the emergency nature of the situation, but he believes that tuition increases will provide the solution through periodic adjustments, perhaps every three to five years. The library's costs keep rising but the legislature has been reluctant to provide any substantial boost to Tarlton's funds. As Wellborn explained in an interview, the bulk of the library's purchases are non-discretion ary (e.g., magazine subscriptions, continuing volumes to a reporter series) and the costs of such books steadily increase. In fact, this year Dean Mark Yudof was forced to supplement necessary library expenses by taking money from the Dean's Discretionary Fund. The fund is designed not to be used for expenses within the law school's academic structure, but for unbudgeted circumstances such as the special needs of student organizations. A Special Committee of the Board of Visitors, a group of alumni, submitted a report in April, 1989 stating that a $300,000 per year increase in funds was needed simply to keep the library's book-buying ability at an adequate level. The committee mentioned several possible methods of obtaining the funds but concluded 10 — Troubled Time foe the Library

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r«’v 5 AROUND TOWNES 1990 PEREGRINUS A Shift to Lcttets — 9

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AROUND TOWNES 1990 PEREGRINUS with a recommendation that a flat fee of $100 be assessed each semester for each law student. One of the possible alternatives was for the law school to solicit donations from law firms and other private sources. Of course, the amount of donations would necessarily fluctuate on a yearly basis and is a very difficult source around which to set a budget. Additionally, to obtain an annual cash flow of $300,000 would require an endowment increase of four to five million dollars — which is a tough accomplishment, especially considering the current library endowment is less than two million dollars. Another possibility was to charge a use fee to persons, such as practicing attorneys, who use the library for work-related purposes. However, this possibility contains the administrative complication of sorting people out, since a significant portion of library use is by students working part-time for area law firms. Furthermore, Hartman indicated that once firms arc charged, they would expect service of equal priority to students in terms of time and resources. Firms might also expect the purchase of more books which are specifically targeted for practicing attorneys — but such books tend to be more expensive than average law school books, so the funding problem might actually be exacerbated. Still, these possibilities will be investigated further. Dean Yudof and UT President William Cunningham met informally and decided that the $7 per hour tuition hike would be best, hence the increase was submitted to the Board of Regents. The proceeds from the tuition increase will go almost exclusively to book purchases, but a likewise emergency situation remains regarding salaries of library employees. In the aforementioned library survey, Tarlton ranked 107th in average professional salary and 144th in average support salary of employees. Hartman remarked, The reason we've been able to keep people, for now at least, is that it's a great library.” And the fact that Roy Mersky, Director of Rcseach, is a highly, if not the most, respected law librarian throughout the country is another selling point for the library. Unfortunately, Hartman added, There comes a point when the (pay) disparity is too great to make up for (the prestige of working at Tarlton).” Indeed, Tarlton has been operating with three professional vacancies for the past two years, with the workload simply being redistributed. However, the increasing use of computer services has changed the face of library use and the importance of library personnel. There was a time,” Hartman said, when by just providing a great collection of books, you had a good library,” but that time has long past. As the relative quality of Tarlton's collection decreases and he prospect of losing quality staff members to other libraries looms distressingly dose to materialization, the prestige of UT School of Law is sure to suffer. The library's crisis is far from over. Troubled Time for tbe Library — 11