Mark Lim has been forced to temporarily close the street library outside his home after being robbed four times in one year.
The 48-year-old Sydney man is an avid street bounty and recyclables collector, often going through bins to hunt for items to save from the landfill.
He began noticing that dozens of books were being thrown out.
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“I go out, I see all these lovely books, so I rescue them,” he said.
Lim would take those books and put them into a street library he opened outside his home in Enfield.
But late last week, he found that someone had completely cleared out the library in the span of a few hours.
“I’m mad. Why do they want to take so many books for?” he said.
“I try to give back to the community.”
This was not the first time this had happened to Lim.
He said his street library has been cleared out three other times in the past year.
“I thought someone has an issue with me. I thought they were targeting me,” he said.
The latest incident has been disappointing, forcing him to leave his street library empty.
“What’s the point? I’ll leave it empty for a while and see how it goes,” he said.
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Street Library general manager Mel Lake confirmed there have been a few thefts across some of the nearly 6000 street libraries across Australia, but said Lim’s situation seemed “really extreme”.
“Certainly nothing particular to any area, but we do get some reports of street libraries being cleared out,” she said.
“We don’t want people who are abusing the system, and it really is a minority.
“We don’t want them to wreck it for everyone.”
Burwood Council does not regulate or manage the street libraries, and has not received any reports of thefts.
But a council spokesperson said the community may “reasonably” assume the books are free to take.
Lake advises street librarians to let their neighbours know of any thefts, install solar lighting, place bells on the library door and write a sign explaining the purpose of the library.
“If no one has street libraries, then that’s a really beautiful community initiative that’s lost, and the people who are abusing the privilege of having them in their community win,” she said.
“That’s not what you want. You just want to figure out how to deter them from doing it.”
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