Our local libraries are more than just great big book racks. They are cultural focal points of our suburbia, sprawled zip codes without downtowns and natural centers of community activity. School districts have been racing to pass large bond issues for building expansion, and even new school buildings, to deal with rising projected enrollments. It's important that our big picture include a vision of our public libraries that can meet rising community needs and expectations.

Most people can't afford a lot of expensive books and reference materials, the kind of materials that help children to learn, that help adults continue to learn, that help create educated, concerned and well-rounded citizens. We pool our resources and then there's a place we can go to read the things that otherwise would never be available to us.

The mission of our libraries has expanded along with the missions of our public schools. Just as our schools are now expected to teach more than the three Rs, and to confront all kinds of social and health challenges, our libraries have taken on more, also.

The public library is now a day care provider, as evidenced by the large number of young people who populate the chairs and aisles after school before being picked up by parents. The library is a career center, guidance center for pre-college teens and sometimes an employment center. The library is the public purveyor of new technologies, and is expected to provide not just books, but video tapes, CDs, computer access and terminals and now DVDs. The library is a public meeting room. The library is a public theater for films, speeches and children's programs. The library is expected to be keeper of our local histories in books, pamphlets and microfilm.

In order to be all of those things, most local libraries have to become less and less of what they originally were: A repository for books. Every week, many libraries sell off low-circulation books to make room for the new technologies. Some of these books can never be replaced, horrifying purists and book lovers, but satisfying the expectations of much of the public. There simply isn't space in older buildings.

The lack of space is a critical public issue. Each month that goes by bleeds off the cultural wealth accumulated over years.

My own local library, Shelter Rock, has a special history in which residents of parts of four school districts campaigned and lobbied the state and the town for the right to pay library taxes and build a first-class library. After 30 years, the library building is simply out of room all around. The record collection went a few years ago. Each week more and more books go. Luckily, very recently the library's board of directors began talking about expansion options. The community, fiercely pro-education, needs to step up and let them know that support is there for action. Agitation for library space has begun in adjacent communities, and a few people have thought about potential joint action.

Some communities are taking action. But library action has generally lagged behind action involving public schools, and the two really should go hand in hand. Because the quality of our libraries goes hand in hand with the quality of our communities.