Check Out the BenefitThe economic benefits of the Ottawa Public Library

The Ottawa Public Library (OPL) vision is to Ottawa’s ROI build communities and transform lives.

Measuring how well OPL is realizing this vision means looking at more than traditional metrics like library usage and operational efficiency. It means measuring the impact OPL is making for the citizens of Ottawa.

To that end, OPLstudied the benefits it generated in 2015. This inaugural study concluded that the library generated $256 million in benefits for the region in 2015, and delivered a 417% return on investment (ROI). For each hour the library’s 33 branches were open in 2015, the community received $2,208 in benefits.

OPL benefits all of the residents and businesses of Ottawa, not just those that contribute to the nearly 5 million in-person visits annually.

As a next step, and to fully measure how well the OPL is realizing its vision, OPL will study the social impact of the library and produce a companion report in 2018.

For an interactive web version and the full study, visit biblioottawalibrary.ca/impact.

$5.17 in benefits

$1 invested

$2,208

per hour of operation

About the Study For this study, OPL adapted a methodology developed for the Toronto Public Library by the Martin Prosperity Institute at the University of Toronto.

OPL looked at two types of benefits:

1) Direct benefits from customers making use of OPL’s products, activities, and services. Market comparators were used to calculate the value of having access to products, activities, and services without a direct cost. In order to account for the difference between owning and borrowing materials, a discount of 40% was applied.

2) Indirect benefits from OPL spending. Traditional economic multipliers from the library sector were used to determine how spending supports local businesses and employees.

To calculate the return on investment, OPL compared the direct and indirect benefits against:

• Spending, • # of cardholders, households, residents; and, • Branch hours of operation.

The results show that for every dollar invested in OPL in 2015, the community benefitted from a $5.17 ROI, in line with Toronto’s $5.63 ROI.

Direct Benefit $179.1 million

Indirect Benefit $76.9 million

Benefits per...

Household

$635

Cardholder

$1,038

Citizen

$266