The Wareham Free Library could be another step closer to recertification, if Town Administrator Derek Sullivan approves the library trustees’ proposed budget Nov. 30.

Reference services librarian Deb Rich said she and the other library Board members hammered out a budget that includes keeping Spinney open, and adding another open day to the branch.

The proposed budget is $269,245.92, and is what Rich terms “baseline plus five,” meaning the library’s basic operating costs, plus five more hours at the Spinney branch. This is also contingent upon the town taking over the Spinney branch, which costs approximately $30,000 to run.

“The Friends won’t be able to do it, next year. They don’t have the money,” Rich said. “The money that they are using was raised as part of the capital campaign to renovate Spinney. They had to use it at Spinney – it was raised for that purpose – and they are using it for operating expenses at Spinney, but it’s a finite … amount of money that won’t last.”

Rich hesitates to predict the worst, but said the just-refurbished Spinney could shut down again, if the Sullivan does not approve the budget. Spinney was previously shuttered, due to budget cuts, in 2014.

“It’s a possibility,” Rich said. “I don’t want to say definitively that it would, but the money has to come from somewhere. … I don’t know how the Town is going to feel about continuing Spinney.”

Despite appearances, Rich said both the library sees plenty of patrons – and she knows, she said, because the librarians keep daily tallies. On average, the main library sees about 300 patrons, while the Spinney branch sees 30.

However, the Spinney branch also serves as a space for the state’s Head Start kids to come in on a weekly basis for storytime with librarian Marcia Hickey. The program, which provides educational services to low-income children, utilizes the library as main source of reading education for Wareham’s and Onset’s children. Rich said she sees close to 60 children in the Spinney branch, during storytime, and Hickey said the children also get the benefit of receiving a free book every time they come – which they would lose, should Spinney shut down.

“They are losing access to the libraries, storytime, crafts, and building a library of books,” Hickey said.

But it’s not just the children who would lose out.

“When Head Start comes, they come with parent volunteers, so it’s also exposing their parent to the library, too, which is a really good thing,” Hickey said. “For the families who may not feel comfortable with the library … when they come with their children, they get to feel comfortable, and we welcome them, and show them how easy it is to get a library card. Whole families are losing that experience.”

Rich said the Wareham Library Foundation is “working with some consultants to put together a … fiscal plan for the library for the next three years,” in order to develop a path to recertification.

She also said the Foundation may be able to help with the cost of running Spinney.

“The Foundation has a certain amount of money put away, and they are making proposals to share some costs with the town,” Rich said. “It might be possible for the Foundation to pick up the money for Spinney. I don’t want to say it is, I don’t want to say it isn’t. There’s money out there. We just have to find a significant pool of it to run the Spinney separately.”

The library will bring the budget before the town at the Spring 2016 Town Meeting.