> And these increasingly popular initiatives have been proven successful: After the policy change, Chicago public libraries saw an increase in returned material

> And these increasingly popular initiatives have been proven successful: After the policy change, Chicago public libraries saw an increase in returned materials as well as library card renewals, according to a previous NPR report. It seems like fines are not very effective at getting people to return stuff on time, but they are effective at getting people to never return things and stop going to the library once they have a few late books, because they can't afford the fines. To directly answer your question, they can just ask people to please be respectful and try to return things on time, and they can stop people from checking out new items if they have too many overdue ones. The problem isn't big enough to warrant stronger measures than that.