Carlsbad to Apply for Latino Library Aid Grant, With 1 Condition

Under pressure from Latinos, the Carlsbad City Council voted unanimously Tuesday night to make a last-minute application for a $157,000 federal grant to provide Spanish-speaking residents with special library service.

The council’s action appears to have mended fences after a city official’s earlier refusal to put the grant application on the council agenda had angered some Latino activists.

Still, the 5-0 decision to apply for the grant by today’s deadline includes a condition. The council, worried that the city will be stuck with paying for the library program after the first year, won’t accept the grant until its potential fiscal impact is studied.

Some residents of Carlsbad’s downtown barrio of 9,000 Latinos urged the council to give them a place to learn American laws, where to find tax information and how to seek a driver’s license.

“We Hispanics are willing to obey all the rules of this country,” said Luis Maldonado, who spoke through an interpreter. “But a lot of times we don’t do it because we don’t know the process.”

He said many Latinos “don’t even know how to use a telephone directory.”

“Our knowledge is very limited, we need a trustworthy source of information,” Maldonado said. “The place where we come from, there are not too many libraries.”

Clifford Lange, the city library director, told the council he has long been concerned with serving the city’s Latino population. But he said a survey revealed that “the library is perceived as an Anglo institution largely irrelevant to Hispanic lives.”

Although the city’s main library at the Civic Center is less than a mile from the barrio, Lange said, “the psychological difference between the library and the neighborhood is immense.”

As Lang envisions a temporary, “transitional” information and referral center to serve Latinos by, among other things, helping them get tax aid, find English classes and provide a children’s library.

It would have a bilingual staff consisting of a manager, an assistant and three part-time clerks. Lang believes a state grant will “lay the groundwork” leading to a permanent program funded by the library when the grant runs out.

The grant became controversial last week when Assistant City Manager Frank Mannen, believing the grant’s financial impact on the city wasn’t fully known, didn’t put the matter on the council agenda in time for the grant application deadline.

Gloria Valencia-Cothran and other local activists called Mannen’s decision a “slap” at the Latino community that showed how little regard City Hall has for Latino needs.

Mayor Bud Lewis called a special meeting to consider the application, and council members, after asking a few questions, voted without comment. The action soothed injured feelings.

Valencia-Cothran thanked the council and said, “We see this as an opportunity for these young families in the barrio to participate in their children’s education.”