Hi Aaron,
Good chatting with you this evening after “meeting” (virtually) at the Sunshine Ordinance Task Force meeting on Tuesday. I’m copying our local email discussion list, which you’re welcome to join, on this message (just send an email to the list address and follow the instructions), in case anyone else wants to weigh in.
As I mentioned, LPSF meetings are the 2nd Saturday each month from 3-5pm, usually in the 3rd floor Paley community room of the SF main library (100 Grove Street). Since Covid, we’ve also let people participate virtually via JitSi (a videoconferencing platform like Zoom) at Jitsi Meet.
Our next meeting is Saturday, May 9.
Would you be able to come in person that day and talk to us about your experiences as a homeless and RV-dwelling person with Urban Alchemy and the government bureaucracy (aka the “Homeless Industrial Complex”)?
It sounds like you have some info that would be interesting for our members to hear, and I’d also, if you’re amenable, be interested in your assistance developing a piece of outreach literature to homeless folks. As mentioned, I’d like to try to help homeless people in SF, maybe specifically vehicularly-housed folks specifically as a more readily organized subset thereof, to try to get more organized in defending their legitimate rights, without just becoming another group trying to feed at the government trough at taxpayer expense.
Please let me know as soon as you can if May or some other month would be good for you, and if you have any interest in this project.
By the way, after some more searching, I was able to identify the location and more info about the special library building I mentioned that’s closed to the public. See info from AI below. Some of the specific things I’m wondering about include:
• How can you see a full list of everything in the library’s collection, sorted by author, by title, by subject? (Right now, apparently you can’t, which would seemingly make it difficult or impossible to do any real audit or get a real overview of the collection.)
• Does the SF Public Library have any ideological or other biases (favoring certain publishers, authors, etc.?) in the types of material they choose to acquire for their collection?
• Who makes the actual decisions about which materials to acquire?
• What criteria are used in making these decisions?
• Why can’t the public see “how the sausage is made” in terms of knowing the details of this process?
• What is the budget for acquiring new materials, and how is it allocated (how much for books, how much for videos, how much for music, how much for audio books, etc.)
• What materials is the public requesting, and how closely do their requests tend to match what the SFPL actually acquires?
• How is it decided which materials go to which branches?
• Why doesn’t the library maintain a list of “newly acquired materials”?
Love & Liberty,
((( starchild )))
Chair, Libertarian Party of San Francisco
LPSF.org http://lpsf.org/
(415) 573-7997
Social Media
San Francisco Libertarian Party Meetup | Meetup http://meetup.com/the-LPSF
X.com/SanFranciscoLP http://x.com/SanFranciscoLP
Facebook.com/LPSF1 http://facebook.com/LPSF1
Instagram.com/LibertarianPartySF http://instagram.com/LibertarianPartySF
···
What is the San Francisco Public Library building at 190 Ninth Street?
The San Francisco Public Library building at 190 Ninth Street is not a public branch library you can visit—it’s an internal facility known as the Catalog & Technical Services Center.
What it is
Officially called the San Francisco Public Library Catalog & Technical Services building
Located at 190 9th St in San Francisco’s SoMa (South of Market) area
Used for behind-the-scenes library operations, not general public services
What happens there
This facility handles the “infrastructure” of the library system, including:
Cataloging books and materials (assigning records, classifications, barcodes)
Processing new items before they’re sent to branches
Managing technical and logistical workflows for the entire library system
What it is not
It is not a neighborhood branch (like the Main Library at San Francisco Main Library or local branches around the city)
It typically isn’t open to the public for browsing or borrowing
Bottom line
Think of 190 Ninth Street as the “back office” or processing hub for the San Francisco Public Library system—the place where materials are prepared and organized before they ever reach the shelves you see in public libraries.
If you want, I can point you to the nearest public SFPL branch you can actually visit.
Why can't you visit there?
You generally can’t visit that building because it isn’t designed as a public-facing library—it’s an internal operations facility.
The San Francisco Public Library uses its Catalog & Technical Services Center at 190 Ninth Street for behind-the-scenes work that supports all its branches. That creates a few practical reasons it’s closed to the public:
1. It’s a workspace, not a service location
Staff there are busy processing, labeling, repairing, and routing materials. There are no reading rooms, checkout desks, or public collections set up for visitors.
2. Logistics and safety
The building functions more like a warehouse and production center:
Constant movement of carts, shipments, and equipment
Storage areas not arranged for public access
Workplace safety rules that limit outside foot traffic
3. Security and inventory control
Before books and media are fully cataloged, they’re part of a controlled workflow. Limiting access helps prevent:
Loss or mix-ups of materials
Disruptions to system-wide processing
4. Efficiency
Keeping it staff-only allows the library system to process thousands of items efficiently without interruptions that a public space would bring.
If you’re looking for a place to actually browse or study, the nearby San Francisco Main Library on Larkin Street is the flagship public location—it’s built for visitors and has full services.
Who's in charge of the building?
The building itself is operated by the San Francisco Public Library, since it’s one of their internal facilities.
In terms of leadership:
The entire library system—including that Technical Services building—is overseen by the City Librarian, currently Michael Lambert (as of recent years).
Day-to-day operations inside that specific building are handled by department managers and supervisorsresponsible for cataloging, processing, and logistics—not a single public-facing “head” of the building.
So there isn’t a standalone “director” just for 190 Ninth Street; it’s part of the broader SFPL system, managed within its internal organizational structure.
How can you browse the full lists of titles and authors in the SF Public Library's collections?
To browse the full list of titles and authors in the San Francisco Public Library collection, you don’t go to a physical building like the 190 Ninth Street facility—you use their online catalog system.
Main way: the online catalog
Go to the SFPL website and use their catalog (often branded as “SFPL Discover & Go / Library Catalog”). There you can:
Search by author, title, subject, or keyword
Click an author’s name to see all works by that author in the system
Browse by subjects or genres (e.g., “science fiction,” “California history”)
Filter results by format (books, ebooks, audiobooks, DVDs, etc.)
Browsing like a “full list”
There isn’t a single giant alphabetical list of everything (it would be enormous), but you can effectively browse broadly by:
Leaving the search box blank and selecting filters (like “Books”) to see large result sets
Searching a common term like “a” or “the” and then sorting A–Z by title or author
Clicking into subject headings to explore collections in a structured way
In person option
At branches like the San Francisco Main Library, public computers give you access to the same catalog, plus staff can help you navigate deeper searches.
Bonus: digital collections
Your SFPL card also gives access to apps like:
Libby (ebooks & audiobooks)
Hoopla (movies, music, comics)
These platforms let you browse large portions of the library’s holdings in a more visual, scrollable way.
If you want, tell me what kind of books or authors you’re interested in, and I can show you the fastest way to pull up a huge browsable list in their catalog.
Show the fastest way to pull up a huge browsable list in their catalog, and say what ISN'T included.
Here’s the fastest way to get a massive, scrollable list in the San Francisco Public Library catalog—without needing a very specific search:
🚀 Quick method (works in seconds)
Go to the SFPL catalog page
In the search box, type a very common term like:
a (fastest, returns huge results)
or the
Hit search
Immediately:
Sort by Title (A–Z) or Author (A–Z)
Set a format filter like Books (optional, but cleaner)
👉 You’ll now have a giant, browsable list you can scroll through page by page—effectively simulating a full catalog browse.
🔍 Even better (more structured browsing)
If you want something less random but still large:
Search a broad subject like:
“fiction”
“history”
“science”
Then:
Sort A–Z
Use filters (language, format, year, etc.)
Click a subject heading inside a result to expand into a whole category
This gives you huge lists that are still organized.
⚠️ What this does NOT include
Even though the catalog feels comprehensive, your browsing results won’t truly show everything. Here’s what’s missing or limited:
1. Items not yet processed
Materials still being handled at the Technical Services center (the 190 Ninth Street building) may not appear yet.
2. Some special collections
Rare or archival materials (e.g., local history archives) may:
Not be fully listed
Require separate databases or in-person access
3. Licensed digital content quirks
Apps like Libby or Hoopla:
Sometimes show items differently
May include titles not easily discoverable through the main catalog browse
4. External or partner resources
Databases, academic journals, and streaming services linked through SFPL:
Aren’t fully browsable as a single A–Z list
Require separate search interfaces
5. Suppressed or restricted records
Some items may be:
Temporarily hidden (lost, under review, withdrawn)
Not visible to the public catalog
🧠 Bottom line
You can simulate browsing the whole library by using a broad search + A–Z sorting—but it’s still a filtered view of a live system, not a single complete master list.
If you want, I can show a trick to narrow that giant list without losing scale (for example, “all sci-fi novels A–Z” or “every book by authors starting with M”).
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