The St Tammany Parish Library System is an agency of parish government which is governed by a Library Board of Control.   The board members are appointed by both the St. Tammany Parish Council and the Parish President.  The primary source (i.e., ninety-three percent) of the library’s income is a 6.33 property tax millage; currently, however, only 5.35 mils are being collected.  This millage will expire in 2024.  The St. Tammany Parish Library System receives no sales taxes.  The remaining seven percent of the system’s income comes from interest, state revenue sharing, grants, state aid, federal E-Rate money, donations and gifts.  Fines for overdue books and fees for copies and replacement library cards are approximately one percent of the total income. 

The State Library of Louisiana in its latest published Statistical Report ranked St. Tammany Parish Library 35th (out of 66) in local per capita spending in 2007.  This calculation was based on a population count of less than 227,000.  The parish government is using a population of 236,625 which would drop our ranking in per capita spending to 39th (or about $24.11 per citizen).  The most fundamental problem facing our library system is lack of space.  No new facility has been built in a generation.  There has been no construction during the entire ‘age of the internet.’   Space requirements have increased to accommodate computer stations and new information formats such as CDs and DVDs.  There has been a large demand for meeting and programming space.   Shelf space for new materials, areas for displaying resources, and room for computer literacy training are all greatly needed.  St Tammany Parish Library System now functions with only one-fifth of the space requirements prescribed by standards set by the Louisiana Library Association.