Niverville opens library, councillor said it was a long time coming
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Niverville opened its Take One, Leave One library on Oct. 27 and Coun. Meghan Beasant said it was “a long time coming.”
“It’s very exciting that it’s finally here,” she said.
It took about two years for the library to be planned and constructed in the south end of the Niverville Centennial Arena.
Visitor and library user Jennifer Friesen said having a library would be a great resource for the public and she sees this as a first step to getting a formal library, which will offer programing that the community needs.
“I hope (the public will use it a lot), because the more they use it, the more the leadership will see that perhaps a bigger library will thrive. That’s my family’s hope, because we are big library people.”
In the last election, as part of her platform, Beasant was promoting the idea of having a library in Niverville. She said as a stay-at-home mom for the past 11 years, she knows the difficulty in going to another community to get books for her family.
“I’m excited. I know it’s not necessarily the full-blown library that of course everybody would love and would benefit from, but it’s just where we’re at right now. And as we all keep saying, it’s a start and you have to start somewhere. So I’m excited that I could at least provide the first stepping stone.”
What it would take to have a formal library is multi-step multi-year endeavor. A committee would have to be formed as the first step, whereupon many other steps will be taken such as acquiring staffing and provincial funding.
Beasant said the Take One, Leave One model was chosen because it was the easiest way to handle the collection and because there are many little Take One, Leave One libraries around town so the public is used to that model.
Council has considered implementing rolling shelves for the library in order to expand the space it currently occupies into the multi-purpose area situated next to the library. They have also talked about having tablets for library users.
“That’s why I like to say that this is definitely going to be a work in progress, and it will be for quite some time. It’s a new concept. We still have to see how many volunteers we get, and then hopefully we see the public turn out for it and the more people that come, the easier it is to insist on more space,” said Beasant.
There are currently six to seven volunteers who will work at the library, but Beasant said the municipality would like to have more as the library is only open when there is a volunteer present.
As for a regional library, Beasant said talks are still happening. As to what it will look like, she said that is being discussed amongst the 10 municipalities that are considering being a part of a regional library system.
“What a regional library looks like, actually doesn’t have much of a definition. The only kinds of guidelines…are about how it should be run, like financially, how a regional library needs to be run, where their funding comes from, staff and things like that. But in terms of what it looks like, is it one major location? Is it lots of locations? Is it a mobile vehicle? Whatever it may be, that is not set in stone, and that is actually up to the communities involved to discuss and decide what works best for them.”
The hours for the library are as follows and are subject to change: Monday 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.; Tuesday 5 p.m. to 9 p.m.; Wednesday 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.; Thursday 5 p.m. to 9 p.m.; and Sunday 9 a.m. to noon and 2 p.m. to 5 p.m.