This is the fourth in a series of reports evaluating the Public Library Statistics (PLS) program, an annual census of public libraries in the United States. The census includes, in addition to a full count of public libraries and their outlets, a variety of statistics about the services provided by and, the financial condition and the staffing levels of public libraries. This report contains the results of an evaluation of the definitions and internal consistency of the staffing variables and a comparison of the statistics collected for these variables to selected statistics from independent sources. This evaluation was conducted to raise specific issues for discussion among members of the Federal State Cooperative System for Public Library Data. Chapter 1 evaluates the definitions used for the staff variables, while Chapter 2 considers the internal consistency of staff measures. Chapter 3 compares statistics from the public library census to those from other reference sources for public library staffing information. Four appendixes list the variables, libraries without paid staff, and library reports and directories, and present comparisons of dataset and other figures. (Contains 70 references and 14 tables.) (SLD)

The tables in this report summarize information about public libraries in fiscal year 1993. These data were collected through the sixth Public Libraries Survey. Respondents for this census were the 8,929 public libraries identified in the 50 states and District of Columbia, by state library agencies. Over 71% of the population of legally served areas in the United States were served by fewer than 11% of public libraries; 1,454 public libraries (over 16%) reported one or more branch library outlets, with a total of 7,017; total operating expenditures for public libraries were over $4.7 billion in 1993; libraries reported a total of nearly 111,945 paid full-time equivalent (FTE) staff; and total nationwide circulation of library materials was nearly 1.6 billion, or 6.5 per capita. The report begins by presenting highlights of the findings. The introduction then describes the terminology used in the document; the universe represented by the data; data collection and use of the technology; and quality review of the data. Also included are caveats for using the data; information on ordering machine readable data and publications; and a source for further information on public library statistics. The data are presented in 19 sets of tables, which make up the major part of this report. Data is provided on staffing; operating income and expenditures; type of governance; type of administrative structure; size of collection; and service measures such as reference transactions; public service hours; interlibrary loan; circulation; and library visits. Appendices include background of the Federal-State Cooperative System (FSCS), a glossary, and a list of states with overlapping population of legal service area. (MAS)