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    Missouri S&T students helped reorganize the Bourbon library last winter as the Crawford County Library District prepared to launch

Crawford County Library District Approaches One-Year Anniversary

A year ago this month, Elizabeth Outar, the newly-hired Crawford County Library District director, looked at her to-do list and thought it would never end.

Outar and library district board members were heading into an unknown. They were finalizing their split from the Ozark Regional Library system after a decades-long partnership and forging a standalone district in Crawford County.

The split became official at the end of January 2018 and the new district was set to be launched in March.

“When I stepped into this job that first month of January when there was no office and we didn’t own the libraries, it seemed overwhelming in the moment,” Outar said. 

Outar, board members, employees and volunteers pulled it off. As the one-year anniversary of the reopening approaches, Outar and board member Annalee Williams say the district is thriving. Community groups are using the libraries, programming is up and circulation has soared. Nearly 5,000 library cards have been distributed. 

“We are making the library part of the community again,” Williams said.

When the Bourbon branch existed as part of ORL, it was often one of the most forgotten in the system. The library was open just 16 hours per week and despite Crawford County board members pushing ORL for more hours, they were rejected.

Bourbon is now open eight hours per day, six days per week. Outar said patrons in the city are thrilled with the changes.

County branches have gone from being open just 85 hours per week combined to 144. Williams said they are considering adding more hours during Daylight Savings Time and offsetting hours during the winter months.

In April 2017, county voters passed a property tax increase that generated more revenue for the library district. With Crawford County getting to keep its tax money, the board has been able to bulk up the staff. There are five full-time employees, four part-time employees and they are preparing to add another full-time and part-time position.

“We are very competitive with our wages,” said Williams, who noted that the district is financially strong.

Outar said the staff is spread too thin right now and with two more employees, they can add help to the children’s programming and work with branch managers to keep circulation from getting backlogged.

Technology

In January, the library district announced it had received a $30,000 grant from the Chymiak Family Foundation to purchase new computers for all three libraries. 

“All the technology was dated to the 1990s,” said Outar about the current hardware. Internet speeds lagged way behind, with Bourbon being the slowest. All the computers are scheduled to be installed by March 1 to coincide with the one-year anniversary of the opening.

New computer tables have been purchased at Bourbon and Outar hopes to add more updated furnishings.

Programming

The first summer program was held last year and more than 400 children county-wide participated. 

“It was the most we had seen in the program in 15 years,” Williams said. “It totally blew our minds.”

The deadline for state and federal grants to be used for the summer program was the previous November. Crawford County still belonged to ORL and with that, the district had to rely on the community to make it more robust. 

To celebrate the 50-year anniversary of Neil Armstrong’s moon landing, the summer 2019 program will focus on outer space. Outar is already planning some creative programming around it.

“I think we are going to have at least one Missouri S&T alum who is a NASA astronaut Skype in and talk to the kids and have the Mars Rover team from S&T come over,” Outar said. “It will be all kinds of fun space stuff. From June 1 to August 1, we will be running ourselves silly.”

But that is okay, Williams said. Library officials are ready to make the program even bigger.

Open Houses

To celebrate one year, open houses will be held in March the following dates.

March 12 - Recklein Memorial in Cuba, 6 p.m.

March 19 - Steelville Library, 5 p.m.

March 21 - Bourbon Library, 6 p.m.

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