Supervisors approve auctioning of newspapers in library archives

Last week, the Yuba County Board of Supervisors declared the newspapers in the archives room of the Yuba County Library to be surplus property that will be auctioned to the public.

The decision passed as part of the consent calendar during the Feb. 9 meeting. In 2019, the library hired a consultant who recommended reconfiguring the existing floor plan by moving the archives room to the mezzanine area, and the existing space be used as a children’s area, according to a staff report.

The archives room holds historical material including newspapers dating back to 1851. The newspapers were microfilmed to preserve them and then digitized beginning in 2014.

The digitized newspapers are now available to the public online on the Digital Reel database.

As part of relocating the archives room, staff is unable to move the newspapers due to the size, weight and number of bound volumes. According to a staff report, there are 313 bound volumes and not enough storage room in the new location. Because the newspapers are online and have been preserved in microfilm, auctioning the original newspapers

will eliminate the storage issue and allow staff to relocate the archives room.

The auction process will be handled by Yuba County Administrative Services, according to library administrative services officer Sandeep Sidhu.

“Once the items have been listed on the website the public can begin bidding for them,” Sidhu said in an email. “The public will not be allowed to come into the library to look through the volumes, they will need to refer to the website for all the relevant info.”

The volumes will be available on the county’s public surplus website https://bit.ly/37fen3u.

“Administrative Services will inform the library when a bound volume is sold,” Sidhu said. “Library staff will ensure the correct item is pulled from the room and is ready for pick up.”

She said Administrative Services will arrange the date and time with the buyer and meet them at the library for pick up.

According to the staff report, the library will realize a small amount of revenue from the sale of the surplus newspapers.