Protecting material priority in library grant application

Ideas abound as the Gibson Memorial Library board works to upgrade the library building and services offered.

While some ideas are blue sky goals, designs and dreams that might one day become a reality, others are being actively planned. In the end, each goal harkens back to the 2025-27 strategic plan, which focuses on providing resources to the community and making the library a comfortable space to visit.

Library Director Danielle Dickinson Thaden presented a handful of these ideas during Monday’s board meeting, pairing them with possible grant opportunities coming up.

“Some [projects] seem to coincide with our goals and also with the upcoming SCICF grant cycle, which those are due on April 1st,” Dickinson Thaden said. “I’m sharing these so that we can talk through priorities and then lock in what that grant will submit will look like.”

South Central Iowa Community Foundation awards multiple grants every year to groups in Clarke, Decatur, Lucas, Ringgold and Union counties.

Printing kiosk

The most expensive of the projects is a printing and copying kiosk to both save library staff time during the day and make the printing process easier for patrons.

The quote provided by TBS, totaling a little more than $14,000, includes the kiosk, scanning stations, cloud space and other various services needed to install the kiosk.

“We estimated off the top of our head that we probably spend close to an hour each day helping someone print something,” Dickinson Thaden said. “A lot of times they could figure it out [without help], especially with a system that was designed to be user friendly.”

However, some board members questioned the ease of use, even for tech-savy young people.

“We still have college students who have come in repeatedly and still ask us to help them print,” Board Member and SWCC Library Assistant Rebecca Slick said. “It’s not just the older people.”

Additionally, along with the heavy installation cost, yearly maintenance would be close to the amount the library makes from printing every year.

Board members suggested finding more companies that offer this with the hopes of finding a cheaper alternative.

Soundproof booth

Another idea presented was the installation of a soundproof booth. Dickinson Thaden previously spoke with representatives from Pillar Booth, whose soundproof booth includes its own ventilation, lighting and outlets inside. The booth only requires a single outlet to plug into from the outside.

“I do know that this is a need and something that we don’t currently really offer. We have our downstairs spaces, including our study room, but it’s not soundproof,” Dickinson Thaden said. “So especially thinking of like telehealth type visits or if you have a Zoom class where you have to participate, this sort of design would be really helpful, kind of a game changer.”

However, a single Pillar booth, including installation, costs almost $7,500. Like the printing kiosk, the board suggested looking for more options before pursuing grant opportunities.

Window tints and SCICF grants

The cheapest project and the one the board decided to go with for this season’s SCICF grant is providing solar film for library windows, tinting the light that comes in to both keep spaces cooler and stop materials from fading.

“I thought having something like the solar film would fold well into our original goal with SCICF of having a seating area by a south window, that they’d have the seating area, less the solar film, so that’s not uncomfortably hot or faded through the years,” Dickinson Thaden said.

The board also discussed the possibility of having graphics on some of the film that can only be seen from the outside, such as the library logo or other literary designs.

A quote from Lashier Graphics and Signs for solar film for five windows, without graphics, came to just under $2,000.

The board approved applying for a SCICF grant to cover the tinting of southern library windows. If approved, the grant will be awarded sometime this summer.

In other library news...

Though planning to replace it in the future, the unexpected death of a library furnace has resulted in the moving of repair and maintenance funds in order to pay for the replacement furnace.

The board is keeping an eye on three possible bills that would affect how libraries run. From the U.S. House of Representatives, Bill 7661 would change the types of material available in schools and school libraries, rejecting any material that “involves gender dysphoria or transgenderism.”

The two Iowa bills are HF2324 and HF2622. The first revolves around public libraries sharing materials with public schools, something the board is concerned would negatively affect rural schools’ access to material in general. HF2622 combines a number of proposed bills the board was concerned with last year, including handing over most library duties to the city council and taking state funding away from any library that uses American Library Association language in their policies.