Library bond could provide critical statewide funding for resources

As part of this year's general election, voters in New Mexico will have several bond issues to consider as they peruse the ballot, including GO Bond 2 or the public libraries bond.

The 2024 Capital Projects General Obligation Bond Act will provide approximately $19 million for public libraries throughout the state, including $6 million for higher education libraries, academic, public school, and public library resource acquisitions, $6 million for the Cultural Affairs Department (non-tribal public libraries), $6 million for the Public Education Department, and $1 million for tribal libraries in New Mexico.

GO Bond 2 affects library users at UNM in various ways, including University Libraries, the School of Law Library, the College of Nursing, and health professionals throughout the entire UNM Health System. On UNM's main campus, GO Bonds have provided access to essential resources at University Libraries for the entire campus and have also been used for technology to support library resource use.

At the UNM School of Law, Upper-level UNM Law and Masters of Studies in Law students routinely use in researching for their Law seminar class papers. Additionally, student staff on all three flagship Law Journals use source-and-citation checks for their editorial work and scholarly pursuits. Nearly 35,000 searches were performed in 2023. In FY24, the Law Library used Bond 2 funds to purchase resources that help educate and train our students to become excellent lawyers who will enrich the local community after graduation. These include West Academic Study Aids and Making of Modern Law Supreme Court Records and Briefs databases.

Electronic access to West Academic Study Aids is invaluable to law students. It provides electronic access to tools that first-year and upper-class Law School students rely heavily on to master legal analysis and gain a deeper understanding of topics. During the past year alone, the database has been accessed on more than 12,500 occasions.

On the health side, the Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health (CINAHL) is an essential database for nursing and allied health students and provides full-text access to over 1,800 journals. Accreditation of nursing programs often requires CINAHL access, while NMNEC nursing students have access through local programs. Health professionals in the UNM Health system use CINAHL to improve quality, make clinical decisions, and promote better patient care. More than 45,000 searches were performed via the CINAHL database in 2023, demonstrating the need for health care access.

Since 2018, the library bond provided nearly $275,000 to fund ejournals for research and scholarship spanning all colleges and programs at the UNM Health Sciences Center. Bond 2 helps pay for critical resources that train New Mexico's next generation of healthcare providers and makes up for gaps in funding when publishers' inflation outpaces increases to our annual collection budget, enabling HSLIC librarians to focus on supporting students and student success.

The New Mexico Coalition of Academic Libraries (NMCAL) subscribes to this resource on behalf of academic libraries in New Mexico, significantly reducing the cost for each member institution. Individual subscriptions to these resources would be extremely costly and highly unlikely.

Other resources purchased with library bond funds include books, CDs and DVDs, e-books and e-audio, magazines, and databases. With electronic access to these study aids, students can access and research topics as needed without having to check out limited numbers of copies on course reserves.

If passed, property taxes will increase slightly. However, the cost to taxpayers for this bond is minimal. The State Board of Finance estimates that over 10 years, Bond Issue 2 accounts for $0.82 per $100,000 property value. That is less than the cost of a pack of gum and certainly less than a book, DVD, or database.

For more information about Bond 2, visit N.M. Public Libraries Bond.

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