Independent or with County

Early on in the process of becoming a district you will need to decide whether or not you are going to be completely independent. There is an option of creating an interlocal agreement with the county where you are a part of the county government system.

Advantages to doing this are:

County will handle part of the workload (which could include accounting, insurance, personnel, etc.). Plus you don't have to worry about some of the legal details that come up when you are independent.

Library staff may be able to take advantage of the county benefits.

Disadvantages to doing this are:

It puts you in a vulnerable place as you are going to be dependent upon the county's goodwill. Yes, there is an interlocal agreement in place (which is essentially a contract), but the county could decide to end that agreement when personnel change. They are handling everything, so they do get a say in how your district will run overall.

You may not have to learn as much of the legalese, but you are going to be in a strange area where questions can come up about who ultimately makes library decisions which could include: who owns the building, who really handles staffing issues, and who is responsible for reports, etc. to the Department of Administration.