Public Library Statistics

Current Statistics (last updated May 29, 2009)

Library Boards and Service Points

• 226 municipal and community library boards responsible for serving Albertans.
• Seven regional library systems serving 205 library boards, 291 municipalities, and 253 library service points.
• 310 library service points across Alberta.

Municipalities

• 359 municipalities in Alberta, including Metis Settlements, Improvement Districts and Special Areas
• 311 (86.6%) municipalities provide access to municipal library service.
• 48 municipalities do not provide any level of public library service (many of these are Summer Villages)
• 3,416,952 Albertans have access to a public library: 99.5% of the total provincial population.
• Only 0.47% of the provincial population does not have access to public library service

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Quick Facts About Alberta Public Libraries

LIBRARY USE

• 48% of adult Albertans have used a public library in the last twelve months.
• 64% of Albertan households reported having a member who had used a public library in the past twelve months
  Source: Banister Research & Consulting Inc., 2009

In 2007,
• Albertans had access to over 9.8 million books, CDs, DVDs, eBooks and other materials at Alberta public libraries.  There were 2.94 library items in stock per capita served.
• There were 1,236,268 library cardholders in Alberta, representing 36.9% of the population.
• Albertans borrowed over 34 million items from public libraries.
• Alberta libraries circulated 10.16 items per person.
• Albertans visited their libraries in person 17,443,884 times.
• Albertans visited their libraries virtually through their library’s website 26,329,282 times.
• Over nine hundred thousand people (988,133) took part in one of the 58,833 programs offered by Alberta’s libraries.
• Albertans asked 4,402,790 reference questions.
• Albertans had access to 2,342 computer workstations in public libraries.

LIBRARY FUNDING

In 2007,
• Provincial grants to public library boards totaled $17,202,646.  This represented 11.8% of total library revenue.
• In addition, the province provided an additional $6,952,225 in Public Library Development Initiative (PLDI) grants to public library boards.  This one-time funding represented 4.8% of total library revenue.
• The province also expended $3,412,058 to support the provincial library network.  This included funds for SuperNet connectivity, The Alberta Public Library Electronic Network (APLEN) and the resource sharing network.
• Municipal contributions (excluding in-kind support) to public libraries amounted to $86,456,739, an average of $25.94 per capita served.  This represented 68% of total municipal library board revenue.
• Public libraries spent $19,647,753 on library materials; this averaged $5.90 per capita for population served.
• Public library boards received $10,113,723 in grants from other government sources. This represented 6.8% of total library board revenue.
• Other revenue funds, including fees, fines and fund raising totaled $16,540,090.  This represented 11.1% of total library board revenue.

Between 2002 and 2007,
• Local support for public libraries increased by $30,741,453 (48%)
• Provincial grants to public library boards increased by $2,741,532 (19%)
• Population served by public libraries increased by 415,086 (14.2%)

Support for public library service in Alberta

	2002	2007
Local support per capita served*	$21.94	$28.43
Provincial support per capita served*	$4.96	$5.16

*includes support given to local municipal library boards and regional system boards

OTHER FACTS ABOUT ALBERTA’S PUBLIC LIBRARIES

In 2007,
• There were 1,644 (full-time equivalent) employees in public libraries. In addition, there were 153 full-time employees in regional library systems.  In total, there were 1,797 full-time employees devoted to public library service in Alberta.
• Public libraries were open on average 32.6 hours per week.

Source: Public Library Statistics 2007, Public Library Services Branch