Donations Will Give Libraries a Reprieve : Palos Verdes: Two branches will remain open 16 hours a week for at least a year. Trustees warn, however, that future funding will be an ongoing battle.

Two branches of the Palos Verdes Library District will stay open for at least another year because a fund-raising group and library employees donated money to keep them open on a limited basis.

The district’s Board of Trustees voted 4 to 0 on Thursday to accept a $40,000 donation from the Friends of the Library, a volunteer organization, and an offer from library employees to forgo their salary for one week in December, saving the district about $30,000.

The donations will keep the Malaga Cove and Miraleste branches open for 16 hours a week each. Without the funding, the two sites would have shut down next Friday.

Miraleste had been open 38 hours a week and Malaga Cove 24 hours a week. Each branch will be open on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays from 1 to 5 p.m.

“I was very pleasantly surprised to see how many people are committed to keeping the branches open,” said Trustee Elliott J. Hahn. “Talk is easy, but (employees) are willing to give up their salary to do this.”

The one-time funding also gives the district a reprieve from the controversy over how to make up for a loss of about $1.2 million in its 1993-94 budget. The district lost that money because the state budget, signed by Gov. Pete Wilson last month, shifts property taxes from local jurisdictions to the state.

The district, which covers Palos Verdes Estates, Rancho Palos Verdes, Rolling Hills and Rolling Hills Estates, also has fallen on hard times because of declining property tax revenues. It depends on such funding because it is a self-contained jurisdiction; most other libraries are funded by county or city governments.

The district also will cut Sunday hours at the main Peninsula Center Library, trim one-third of its spending on library materials and eliminate 19 positions. But the board’s decision last month to close the two branches drew the most protest from library users.

Library officials also are wary of state funding shortages next year, as well as proposals in Sacramento that would give county authorities the ability to dissolve special districts.

“We need to recognize that the problems we faced throughout the budget process are still going to be there,” said Trustee Christopher Tara. “The enemy to a large degree comes from off the hill. It comes from Sacramento or the county.”

Trustees also decided to form a Citizens Advisory Committee on Thursday after some residents complained that the district had not searched hard enough for ways to trim the fat from the budget. District officials, however, say that its $2.6-million budget is nearly one-third less than a year ago.

“We don’t feel defensive,” Tara said. “We don’t feel a need to (form the committee). We feel a desire to do it.”

The committee will study ways to fund the district in future years and operate with less money. A report is expected to be completed in October.

“I just hope people realize that this is not a battle that will end tomorrow,” Hahn said. “It’s going to be an ongoing battle for public funding.”