Chestermere Public Library celebrates four years

Bernard Maillet, organizer of the Loop Around the Lake fundraiser, presented a cheque for $7,500 to library board chair Marilyn King.

Board hosts AGM, looks to the future for the library

Bernard Maillet, organizer of the Loop Around the Lake fundraiser, presented a cheque for $7,500 to library board chair Marilyn King.

CHESTERMERE – On Nov. 24, the Chestermere Public Library board held their annual general meeting, as well as celebrated four years of being a part of the community.

Guests enjoyed cake, refreshments and a few short speeches, as well as the cheque presentation from Bernard Maillet to board chair Marilyn King. Maillet is the organizer of the annual Loop Around the Lake event, which fundraises for the library. He has a goal to raise $10,000 in 10 years for the library, and this year contributed a total of $7,500 towards his goal.

Following the cheque presentation and other brief orders of business, King presented the Library’s strategic plan, which outlines the goals and aspirations for the Chestermere Public Library (CPL) for 2012 all the way until 2015.

“We gave ourselves quite the mission statement in saying that we wanted to become the best small town library in all of Alberta,” King said prior to the presentation.

The plan outline began with a message from the board, in which they said that the plan itself had been developed using input from library members, non-users, library staff, board members, community stakeholders and by consulting existing community surveys and studies.
From that input, they were able to focus on six key service responses to work on, which were: creating young readers, stimulating imagination, satisfying curiosity, knowing the community, establishing a comfortable place, and succeeding in schools.

To create more young readers in the community, the CPL hopes that 75 per cent of Chestermere residents below the age of five will have a library card by 2015. They also hope to replace or update 50 per cent of their existing children’s stock with more up-to-date titles, host an average of 20 programming events aimed at children every month, host successful Create Young Readers events and maintain a “child-centric” on the library’s website.

To stimulate imagination, the CPL has set a goal to host an average of four programming events each month, and they hope to see 500 attendees in total at those events each year. They hope to increase active membership by 50 per cent, bringing the number to 10,500 members, as well as increase library checkouts to an average of 8,500 per month.
They also touched on increasing their audio-visual collection and establishing more youth programs.

To satisfy curiosity, the CPL hopes to host 12 programming events per month, replace or update 50 per cent of the existing non-fiction collection with more up-to-date titles, and increase non-fiction circulation by 25 per cent.

To help library users get to know the community, the CPL hopes to set up a community information page on the website with links to groups and resources in Chestermere. They are also hoping to host or participate in four community expo events per year, and partner with four locally based organizations to deliver joint programming locally.

To become a more comfortable place for users, the CPL is looking into increasing the number of visitors to the library to an average of 4,500 per month. They hope to refresh and redecorate the interior of the library to create “zones” to better manage individual user needs. They are also looking to conduct a feasibility study into expansion options to be undertaken and completed. Lastly, they hope to revamp the website and create specific areas dedicated to different user groups, and up the hits on the website to 1,000 per month.

To succeed in schools, the CPL will look the replace or update 50 per cent of the existing junior and teen collections with up-to-date titles, as well as host an average of two weekly homework help sessions. They will also be looking into creating a homework help page on the website which would average around 50 hits per week.

The CPL’s strategic plan is in place for 2012 to 2015, but King said that more exciting changes and advances will undoubtedly be made in that time.
For more information about the library and their programs, go to www.chestermerepubliclibrary.com.

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