Earlier this year, one of my readers informed me that the dumpsters outside the Peoria Public Library downtown were full of books being thrown away. I contacted library officials who explained that they were “weeding” books — a perfectly legitimate process based on established guidelines for libraries.

But now a new anonymous source tells me the library staff is concerned that those weeding guidelines are being thrown out with the books in the basement:

I have attached a couple of photos of bins of books ready to be taken away and destroyed. PPL has stepped up efforts to get rid of the books being stored in its basement levels. They will all be gone soon if this process is not stopped. All the bins in the attached photo are being filled at a rate of a couple of times a day. Shelves of books are being indiscriminately emptied of books regardless of condition or value. Staff here at the library believes that this process is a violation of the responsibility of the library to the citizens. Yes, some of these books are in poor shape and really have no future, but many others could be sold, donated or otherwise reused.

That’s a lot of books. This makes me wonder, why the need to “step up” their weeding efforts? Aren’t we expanding the size of the library buildings overall? It seems there would be plenty of space to continue storing these until a proper weeding could be done. Why the rush?