Seattle's city librarian resigns to join Gates Foundation

Twelve years ago, Seattle's libraries were stumbling. The city librarian resigned under pressure from the library's Board of Trustees.

A bond measure to fund new branches had failed to capture public support. And with the spread of the Internet, many predicted the demise of the book — and with it, the very institution of the public library.

Since then, all of Seattle's library branches have been renovated or replaced after the passage of a $196 million bond. The angular steel-and-glass downtown library has become a signature building for the city.

And the Seattle library has cemented its place in both the bricks-and-mortar and online world, serving as a gathering place to neighborhoods and as a gateway to online information.

The woman who has built the Seattle Public Library into a ubiquitous force, Deborah Jacobs, announced Wednesday she will be leaving her job as city librarian effective July 2 to join the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

As deputy director for the foundation's global-libraries program, Jacobs will work with other countries to expand technology access at public libraries.

"The work I was raised to do was to make the world a better place," said Jacobs, 56, who until now had intended to remain city librarian until retiring.

Eric Liu, president of the library's Board of Trustees, said, "She's left a mark like few people get to in public life. She's revitalized the library as an institution, and she's brought passion and energy to the way the library connects with the community."

Jacobs was hired in 1997 after the departure of City Librarian Liz Stroup, who resigned after losing the support of the board. Stroup had a rocky relationship with then-Mayor Norm Rice and the library workers union, which did not support a bond issue, requested by the mayor and Stroup, to expand libraries in 1994.

"Deborah did a masterful job of bringing about consensus and getting people in line," Rice said Wednesday. "She was the right person at the right time."

Jacobs, who grew up in Southern California, arrived in Seattle from Corvallis, Ore., where she was library director.

"As a young girl, a child of the '50s and '60s, I thought I was going to be a lawyer and do good work," she said. "In my third year of college it hit me: If I really wanted to make the world a better place, the public libraries are where it's at."

Building program

Early on in Seattle, Jacobs rallied support around a $196 million bond measure, which voters approved, to renovate or replace all existing branches and build three new libraries. At the time, it was the largest bond measure ever approved for library construction in the country.

She oversaw that work, which included construction of the downtown library designed by architect Rem Koolhaas, which opened in 2004.

The library's annual budget, funded by the city, has increased from $25 million in 1997 to $47 million this year. Jacobs now makes $178,000 a year.

Circulation has increased by 82 percent, and Jacobs started an online library, including 24-hour reference chat and Internet homework help. With her help, the Seattle Public Library Foundation has built a $25 million endowment.

"We've built all these libraries, but we're not stuck inside the building. We are boundless and ubiquitous, building relationships to communities outside our doors," she said.

She said she is most proud of her work with immigrants, saying Seattle's libraries now provide story times for children in different languages, along with other literacy programs.

One of her most poignant memories is of a Chinese woman who told the foundation's board, through a translator, that "at her local library she was not only taught how to use a computer but now had an e-mail account and could send e-mail and no longer had shame with her grandchildren who were too busy to teach her," Jacobs recounted.

Expanding technology

In her new position at the Gates Foundation, Jacobs will help other countries expand access to technology at public libraries. The program has already awarded $118 million to programs in countries such as Nepal, Latvia and Botswana.

"By providing that public access to information through public libraries, you create a situation where that information empowers all in a society," said Sylvia Mathews Burwell, president of the foundation's global-development programs.

Burwell says she is thrilled that Jacobs is joining the foundation.

Liu said the library board has yet to decide who will serve in the interim after Jacobs' departure. The board is developing a plan to find a successor.

"We want someone who can lead us in the next great chapter," he said. "Now we have the opportunity over the next decade-plus to imagine what libraries for the next generation are going to look like and feel like for our citizens."

Sharon Pian Chan: 206-464-2958 or schan@seattletimes.com