Two staff at East Lake library suspended after discovery of bogus loans, claimed to be a defence against automatic culling of unread books

Florida librarians have come up with a unique way to boost reader numbers and protect book stock. But there is a snag: it involves a little creative accounting.

Two staff at East Lake library have been suspended for allegedly creating bogus borrowers, in order to outwit automated book-culling software designed to ditch titles that are not being read. The accused have alleged that the practice is widespread among librarians fighting to protect book budgets from unnecessary purchases.

An investigation was sparked after an anonymous complaint was filed in November to Lake County municipal staff. The investigation revealed several fake identities with false addresses and drivers’ licence numbers, which had all been created by the librarians, according to the Orlando Sentinel.

The two are reported to have been caught when it emerged that one of the dummy borrowers was Chuck Finley, a retired major-league basketball player. Listed in the East Lake library’s records as “a ballplayer”, Finley appeared to have read 2,361 books, ranging from Cannery Row by John Steinbeck to Why Do My Ears Pop? by Ann Fullick. Some books had been borrowed and returned within an hour.

Staff at the libraries claim the move was to save money: books not borrowed for a long time are automatically flagged for removal by the computer system. Among those accused of taking part is the East Lake library’s branch supervisor George Dore who, local press reported, has been put on administrative leave.

In interviews with municipal authorities, Dore said he wanted to avoid repurchasing books purged from the shelves. He claimed his action “had only one purpose and that was to save items for potential patrons’ use”.

Dore claimed that other libraries have had dummy memberships. “There was a lot of bad blood between the libraries because of money wars,” the interview notes read.

Reader numbers at the libraries count towards budgets granted by the state government. Last year, the East Lake library saw a 4% boost in numbers, thanks in part to the fake identities, and libraries in Lake County received about $1m (£800,000) from Florida state.

Support for the librarians has come from digital activist Cory Doctorow. He attacked the use of automated stock systems, calling it “datafication at its worst”. Writing on his Boing Boing blog, he said: “The pretence that the data can tell you what to optimise as well as how to optimise it makes systems incoherent – it’s the big-data version of ‘teaching to the test’.”

He added: “Instead of being a tool, the data becomes a straightjacket: in order to get the system to admit the professional judgment of librarians, the librarians have to manufacture data to put their thumbs on its scales.”