No more ‘late fines’ at Brooklyn Public Library branches
The joint decision by the Brooklyn, New York City and Queens library systems, announced on Tuesday, to do away with “late fines” may surprise people who grew up in fear of handing in books late and having to pay these fines, but the decision was in the making for the past few years, according to Linda E. Johnson, president and CEO of Brooklyn Public Library.
Moreover, it’s a decision that at least 15 library systems in major cities have also made, including Baltimore, Chicago, Dallas, Miami, San Francisco, Washington, D.C. and others, according to a library spokesperson.
“It’s a decision we had wanted to make three years ago,” said Johnson. “We started working to improve the returns our patrons made, making sure we were communicating when people’s books were due. We were doing that through technology, texts and emails, putting stickers and things on the covers that would make them stand out [from privately owned books] and putting more book drops around the borough.”