Mayor Jenny Durkan doesn’t want Steve DelVecchio — or anyone, for that matter — thinking about fines either. In the proposed seven-year, $213.3 million property tax levy the mayor rolled out last week, Seattle Public Libraries would do away with late fees, following a trend of libraries across the country looking to make access to their materials and services more equitable.

“We find that fines are barriers in ways that they really shouldn’t be, and they don’t need to be, and we can have a better system,” Durkan said as she unveiled the proposal in Lake City.

The decision by large libraries to move away from the punitive fine-based system is grounded in a growing understanding of whom those fines affect most — people in lower-income neighborhoods and communities of color.

Seattle is no exception. While the library does not collect information on the age, race, income or gender of its patrons, there is a strong correlation between lower-income Seattle communities and higher impacts of the fine system.

The branches with the highest proportion of accounts blocked for overdue fines are all in parts of Seattle that are both poorer and more diverse than the city as a whole. They are all in the southern part of the city.

At the South Park library, 20 percent of frequent users’ accounts have been blocked, according to data provided by SPL. In Rainier Beach, the number is 18 percent; at Delridge, the Central District's Douglass Truth and NewHolly in southwest Seattle, 17 percent are blocked.

By contrast, library branches in richer and whiter neighborhoods have significantly fewer blocked accounts. At the Wallingford and Queen Anne branches, just 6 percent of patrons are blocked; at Fremont, Magnolia, Greenlake and Montlake, that number is 7 percent.

The total amount owed follows a similar pattern. In South Park, patrons owe an average of $15.91; in Magnolia, the amount is just $4.60.

Accounts are blocked once fines — which total 25 cents per day, per item — exceed $15. Accounts that exceed $25 in late fines are sent to collections.

DelVecchio — who is careful to avoid advocating for the levy in his official capacity — sees the impact most clearly at the Douglass Truth branch, which he manages in addition to Capitol Hill, Montlake and Madrona/Sally Goldmark. He guesses that the Central District location has a high number of blocked accounts because of how many young people use it. “Kids and teens especially can sometimes be heavily impacted by fines going above the level when you can continue to check out materials, and their parents aren’t necessarily always aware,” he said.

More broadly, though, DelVecchio sees a disproportionate impact. “It absolutely feels like an equity issue to me,” he said.

At the root of the problem is not who is returning books late, but who can afford to do so.