It isn't necessarily their fault, but it still feels false to wax poetically about the educational and societial benefits of what is effectively a homeless shelter.

Not to say that homeless shelters aren't useful to society. Obviously they are. I just doubt that this is what library proponents were thinking about when they talk about libraries.

>but it still feels false to wax poetically about the educational and societial benefits of what is effectively a homeless shelter.

Bridges and overpasses also shelter the homeless sometimes, but their other benefits remain intact, and not all libraries are "effectively homeless shelters."

Indeed those things are both homeless shelters and provide other societal benefits.

The fact that there are homeless people living under bridges, does not take away from the value that the bridge provides.

This is not the case for libraries. For the ones that do act as homeless shelters, you may as well just throw away all the books, and everything, because you aren't going to be getting much work done there.

In the UK, problems in libraries are usually not homeless people.

Care to share what the problems with libraries in the UK are then?

People for whom manners and respect of other people are alien concepts. In the UK, their numbers are growing at an alarming rate, mainly because there is so little done to sanction such behavior.

No, but it is the fault of libraries if they fail to enforce reasonable standards of behavior on the premises.

What do you expect a librarian – who is, after all, not a trained security guard – to do besides simply call the police? And in so many of the examples that I see people complain about, it would seem that the disruption by homeless people or drug users is only noticed after it has taken place (e.g. they trash the toilets or leave needles or paraphenalia behind).

Libraries can hire security (and most around me have).

It’s a sad outcome in it means less funds for library services but it’s better than libraries not being used because people feel unsafe.

What an odd "problem". I would expect the librarian to call the police. And if there was a "trained security guard" on the premises I would expect him to also call the police.

(That's why we have police.)

Clearly you haven't encountered the Police in the UK. Unless it's a life or death emergency situation the default response is often one of disinterest.

Well, you can't rely on police for everything. I mean, they aren't your personal dobermen.

Is it the best option we can provide to them with that money though.

Why can't we just admit that they are homeless shelters and turn them into fulltime homeless shelter instead of pretending to be a library( for whatever sentimental reasons). Seems like we got the worst of both worlds in this case.