The Internet is a drawing card at the Carson City Library

At the Carson City Library, logging on has become as popular as checking out.

Don Tarno checks his e-mail and routinely reads the online newspapers from the Fiji Islands and Sydney, Australia, during his three-and-a-half-month summer stints in Carson City.

"I come here almost every day because we're full-time RV people," said Tarno, who winters in Florida and summers at the Pinon Plaza RV Park. "Internet access at the library adds one more thing for people, especially people like us who don't have e-mail."

The five Internet stations at the library have become e-mail central and a primary source of information for many patrons, especially the younger generation.

"Many times students with assignments first go to the Internet and if they can't find what they need, they come to us," reference librarian Susan Antipa said.

Two Internet stations in the juvenile section may be used only by children. Adults vie for the three stations in the periodical/fiction room.

The Carson City Library got connected in March 1998, and Internet usage has soared in those two years, limited only by lack of space.

The library's Internet era opened with 40 people in the first month using the one terminal the library then had. In March 2000, 1,552 people signed up for Internet time.

The defeat of the CC-1 ballot measure in 1998 essentially limits the number of Internet stations, because each station takes away more space from the reading room.

CC-1 would have increased property taxes 5 cents per $100 assessed valuation - about $17 per year - for 30 years to allow for library expansion, including a room dedicated to computers.

Library Director Sally Edwards had envisioned a room with 20 computers with perhaps 12 having Internet access.

Without the $2.5 million expansion, the library will likely stick with five Internet stations and a half-hour time limit to give people more of a chance for access.

"It's about as good in the current setting as it's going to get," Edwards said. "Having this technology has turned libraries on their ear. It's a whole new world to plan space for technology. A lot of new libraries are constructed with a floor with nothing but computers."

Free Internet access illustrates the purpose of public libraries in a modern way, even if the technology brings misgivings with it.

"It was a concern of the governing board that a lot of stuff on the Internet was not something you'd add to the collection," Edwards said. "The other thing was the Internet was too big to ignore.

"It's now become almost a universal source of information. If we would not offer it here, there are those who could not afford to be on the Internet. There would be those who are information rich and those who are information poor. We wouldn't be meeting our mission if we did not offer Internet access.

"Public use of the Internet for free agrees with our mission to offer all information and material we have to everybody. In that sense, it's a great equalizer, which is what the public library has been all along. The library offers an education to everybody."

Internet access does present a couple of dilemmas: e-mail and pornography.

Library policy does not support using the Internet for e-mail. Viewing pornographic Web sites also is not encouraged, though the policy states that the library "makes no attempt to censor or control the content of information available on the Internet."

The exception is viewing, downloading or printing child pornography, which is against the law.

"Our policy is not to filter the Internet," Edwards said. "We don't censor it. I have been grateful that we haven't had any complaints about our Internet use policy."

The library has Internet access as a research tool, not a communication tool. Yet most users veer toward e-mail.

Library staff mmbers would rather see Web sites than e-mail messages on the screens but, short of looking over users' shoulders, they turn a blind eye to e-mail usage.

"We don't support e-mail, but there's no way to control it," Edwards said.

Total library usage has increased since the Internet was installed, though Edwards has no firm statistics of how many new people are checking out books because of Internet visits.

One Internet user makes weekly visits to the library to log on but he also has become a fan of the video collection.

"I have increased my library usage. I take out more books now," said the man who did not want to give his name, apparently because he was tapped into job listings. "The Internet allows people to keep up to date on what's happening. You can also do job searches."

Wes Storey of Carson City and Dan Webb of Gardnerville teamed up recently at a library Internet terminal. Storey was at the keyboard with Webb watching over his shoulder.

"Right now I'm just watching," Webb said. "I'm not too familiar with it. I'm looking to get a computer soon."

Storey was a library patron before the Internet and he still browses the collections as well as the Internet.

"You can find stuff more easily on the Internet," Storey said. "You can research the world easily."

There's usually a rush for Internet terminals as the library opens at 10 a.m., and during the school year terminals tend to fill up as soon as school lets out. Otherwise, there may be empty terminals any time of day or they could all be in use.