Eco-friendly LA County dedicated its first full-fledged green library in Whittier today.

About 40 percent of the newly constructed Sorensen Library is made with recycled materials and features sun-absorbing roofing material, absorbable pavement, huge windows for lots of natural lighting and drought-tolerant landscaping.

On the inside, lighting is electronically controlled and automatically turn off when they are no longer needed.

Green libraries have been built in Silver Lake and Santa Monica but never within the LA County library system.

The $8.9 million Whittier library is going to

save the county a boat-load of money that would otherwise go towards higher energy and water bills.

Too bad county officials aren't using their thinking skills to solve the LA libraries' bigger problem – that is, keeping the lights on. Earlier this year, city council voted to scale back library service to five days a week, resulting in staff reductions.

Here's a brilliant idea.

Perhaps the left-over funds accumulated from green libraries can be donated back to city coffers, so that officials can resume the library system's much-needed six-day-a-week schedule.

It's a plan that environmentalists and library users could agree with.

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