A proposal to increase funding for the besieged budget of the Harvard College Library spawned a lengthy discussion on the importance and future of the University’s libraries at yesterday’s meeting of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences (FAS), the first to be held in January since 1976.

Citing a need to digitize, preserve and expand the University’s collections, Professor of Latin and vice chair of the FAS Standing Committee on the Library Kathleen M. Coleman asked the administration for a “reasonable” rise in the Library’s funding—2 percent above the inflation rate—to counteract its $2.3 million in cuts for the 2004-2005 fiscal year.

“I would like to see a pledge from the administration to move the library into the priority record for funding, because the library is the lifeblood of every intellectual pursuit in the University,” Coleman said after the meeting.

After Coleman addressed the Faculty, half a dozen professors and Andrew M. McGee ’05 spoke on the importance of the Library, emphasizing the need to upgrade its operations.

“The costs are great, but there is no alternative to proceeding to collect for future generations,” said Classics Department Chair Richard F. Thomas.

University President Lawrence H. Summers, presiding over the meeting, said he found these testimonials “powerful and persuasive,” but did not detail how or if the University would honor the library’s request.

The year 2004 was an eventful one for the Library—Widener Library’s extensive renovation saw completion and Google announced its intent to eventually digitize all of the library’s collections.

Several speakers at the meeting referred to the increasing use of online library resources by students and scholars as a reason for more library funding.

“The digital world is indeed exciting, but for libraries it requires new and ongoing expenses,” said Nancy M. Cline, Larsen Librarian of Harvard College.

Those expenses, Coleman explained, include paying for licenses to academic websites as well as training librarians to work with digital sources.

Coleman also noted that Google’s digitization project does not involve fragile materials, adding another reason why the restoration of the library’s collections is a “critical” priority—the very materials most in need of preservation cannot go digital.

Yet as a result of this year’s budget cuts, several restoration workers have been laid off, and the renovated restoration facility inside Widener Library now operates at 50 percent of its capacity, Coleman said.

Coleman also said that as a result of the dollar’s weakness in international markets, the Library’s acquisition of materials abroad has become considerably more expensive. The cost of materials from Europe rose by 41 percent between 2000 and 2004, according to a June 2004 letter from the Faculty of Arts and Sciences (FAS) Library Committee to Dean of the Faculty William C. Kirby.

In addition to specific arguments for increasing the budget—to which no one objected—descriptions of the Library’s role in the University dominated much of the meeting.

“I could not think of any better way for Harvard to spend its money,” said Mary M. Gaylord, Sosland Family Professor of Romance Languages and Literatures.

After the hour-long library discussion ended, Dean of the Graduate School of Arts and Science (GSAS) Peter T. Ellison gave the Faculty a progress report on his goal of funding all of the approxinately 130 applications for Ph.D-completion fellowships his school receives each year, saying that he still needs money for 17 of them.

Ellison also reiterated his goal to give all GSAS students the opportunity of working as teaching fellows at the College.

—Staff writer Laura L. Krug contributed reporting to this article.

—Staff writer Anton S. Troianovski can be reached at atroian@fas.harvard.edu.