Glitches in a new computer software system installed at Blanchard Community Library in Santa Paula are causing headaches for both library staff and patrons.

The problem is so bad that District Librarian Daniel Robles says he and his staff have resorted to using Internet sites instead of their own catalogue to find information on books and authors for patrons.

"Since most of the staff has been here for a long time, we know the collection," he said, "and so we rely on our memory, our old card system and Web sites like Amazon.com and BarnesandNoble.com."

Robles says that he and his staff have identified 178 problems with the new system, which was supplied by TLC, a company based in West Virginia.

The Santa Paula library is a member of a regional consortium of public libraries, which has decided to withhold payment of the $100,000 it still owes the company for the automated system, known as CARL.X.

The Blanchard Community Library is part of the Black Gold Cooperative Library System, which includes Ventura County Library and libraries in Santa Barbara, Lompoc, Santa Maria, Paso Robles and San Luis Obispo.

However, because Ventura County Library has its own automated computer system, it is unaffected by the problems afflicting the six other member libraries, officials say.

The Black Gold director, Maureen Theobald, who's based in San Luis Obispo, says the CARL.X system cost $300,000. She confirmed that the consortium has paid two-thirds of the money, but won't pay the remainder to TLC, which is short for The Library Corp.

"There's a big difference between what they promised and what they delivered," she said. "This company had a lot of attractive qualities but unfortunately, some of those things weren't there."

Simon Marcus, chief operating officer of TLC, said the company wants to solve any problems.

"TLC is certainly aware of the issues the Black Gold consortium is having, and we are working hard with them to rectify those issues," Marcus said. "It's getting a great deal of attention, and a number of significant fixes have been put in place over the past few weeks."

Since the new system was introduced at the Santa Paula library in October 2007, Robles and his staff have had problems accessing information and using their computerized catalogue.

"For example, if I search for Dan Brown's best-seller The Da Vinci Code,' the first three titles that come up are nonfiction books like The Da Vinci Code Decoded,'" he said. "I have to scroll through two or three screens to find the novel."

The same thing happens when they try to look up patron information.

"I enter my name and I get 163 hits on Robles, Daniel," he said. "I have to scroll down to R' to find myself because it starts with Daniel and then the last names in alphabetical order."

It's leading to frustration among both staff and customers, he says.

"We are very proud of our customer service but our PR is suffering while we try to figure out how to help our customers," he said.

Initially, Robles was told that the system's problems stemmed from the fact the software was designed for use on Windows XP and the library computers were running Windows 2000.

"We had planned to upgrade our system in May when Microsoft will stop offering support to Windows 2000 customers," said Robles. "So we decided to upgrade sooner and we went out last week and bought 10 new computers with XP on them."

But the $12,000 spent on the computers has done little to improve things, said Robles, who commented that there are no guarantees that the CARL.X system will work with Microsoft Vista, the successor to Windows XP.

Blanchard Community Library in Santa Paula pays about $53,000 a year to be part of the Black Gold Network, and since the staff at Santa Paula only works part time, the computer system problems are hurting them the hardest out of all of the six member libraries now using it.

"The other libraries have full-time people who can work on solving the issues," he said.

Molly Gerald, director of Lompoc Public Library, acknowledged that her staff has been kept busy trying to deal with the new system.

"It's been problematic for us, and our staff has developed ways to work around it," she said. "We want something that's easy to use, and it's frustrating when you're accustomed to finding out information and you hit roadblocks trying to do that."

Robles says he would like to replace the CARL.X system with another one, and he is looking into that option.

However, Maureen Theobald at the Black Gold Network says the consortium as a whole has no immediate plans to replace the system.

"We'd sure like to see the problems worked out," she said, "and I am working with (Marcus) on this and they have been quite responsive so far."