It might not seem like a lot, but it is a lot when you consider that most residents don't use the library at all, and that adult book collections aren't great.

850,000 people have to share just 2 copies of Thompson's Calculus Made Easy. (I didn't cherry pick this: I looked up at my bookshelf and picked the first book I saw.)

Very little of the money is spent on books. Only 15% of the money is spent on 'collections', and much of that is spent on things other than books.

SF libraries are nice for children (lots of copies of kids' books, lots of desks to do homework when waiting for parents to get back from work).

But I personally don't find them a convenient source for reading material as, if I want a particular book, they usually don't have it.

SFPL's own stats say they see over 10,000 visitors per day and check out over 12 million items annually. Let's say you allocate 50% ($100M) to each of those two missions: serving as a community space vs. lending materials.

That gives you:

- As a community space: $100M ÷ (10,000 visitors × 365 days) = ~$27 per visit. You could hand every person who walks in a $27 gift card to a coffee shop with free Wi-Fi and they'd arguably get a comparable experience for many use cases.

- As a lending library: $100M ÷ 12,000,000 checkouts = ~$8.30 per checkout. You could just buy most paperbacks and many e-books for that price and give them away.

I misunderstood and thought it was $10/year. SF clearly has a spending problem. Maybe it's to do with the high cost of living.

Follow-up to my other comment. I read through the library's annual report, found here. https://sfpl.org/sites/default/files/archive/2025-12/2024_25...

Libraries do more than lend books and provide community spaces. They also run a lot of programs. So just saying "hand everyone a Starbucks gift card and a paperback every month" doesn't cover everything.

There are worse ways for a city to spend money. SF has a spending problem. Both can be true.

"There are worse ways for a city to spend money."

Yes, San Francisco does all of those, too.

Yep, you also get a quota of 10 suggested purchases for their collection every month - I scour for new books to max mine out and they grant >95% of what I ask for

I've only suggested a purchase a couple of times. I've never heard back, so I assumed whatever I submitted was being ignored.

If you click your username at top right corner and then the bell (which will have a number if there are notifications) you can find out what happened with those requests

I don't see any notifications. When I go to https://sfpl.bibliocommons.com/suggested_purchases I see only:

Showing 0 suggestions.

10 of 10 suggestions left

Hmm if you'd submitted them in past it's strange to see 0 count. I see all of mine there. https://sfpl.bibliocommons.com/user_profile/me/notification_... shows: > Your suggestion has been approved! The library will acquire the following Book: <title>. To learn more and manage your requests, go to Suggested Purchases.

It was a long time ago. Perhaps I submitted using a different form?