EBSCO grant will substantially improve the library’s resilience and sustainability during area emergencies

By Creed Kidd
Library Director

Our considerable thanks to Poudre Valley Rural Electrification Administration (PVREA) for the $25,000 donation that (with the earlier EBSCO grant) will substantially improve the library’s resilience and sustainability during area emergencies as well as throughout the year.

Much appreciated, PVREA. We expect to live up to your board of directors’ level of generosity and trust.

Sadly, we say goodbye to library friends that have passed away this summer: Jill Reynolds, avid reader, wilderness explorer and advocate, radio host and Larimer County Search and Rescue volunteer.  Jill conducted several well-attended programs at the library for winter preparedness, wilderness survival and GPS usage – as well as serving as member of the library’s Materials Selection Committee. She brightened everything she touched – and will be well-missed in our community.

Long-time library volunteer and library services advocate Nancy Heath was a years-long mainstay at the library circulation desk Tuesdays, assisting users, handling the in-and-out process of books requested from and through other libraries as well as compiling library usage statistics. Her dedication and presence are much-missed. She was a charter member of the Bear Paws Quilting group that met Mondays at the library (in those days when the library was closed Mondays) for good conversation and spectacular quilt construction.

Dave Doft was a long-term and long-time library booster that was with us during the days of the Red Feather Library Foundation to and through the formation of the current Library District.  An intense reader, he was one of several leaders of the local Red Feather Men’s Book Club as well as the local ‘think-tank’ group, The Mummy Range Institute. Active both in library volunteering and within the Friends of Red Feather Lakes Community Library, his loss leaves the community and the library much the less.

Another milestone is the library’s 50^th anniversary, a half-century of service from Nov. 4, 1969 through today, providing reading and educational materials, programming and children’s activities, community advocacy, events and service. Our community has grown, as have we.

For the next 50 years the sky’s the limit, working in your behalf. We – and you – have had a great five decades past – but truly …

“You ain’t seen nothin’ yet!” Stay tuned.

Finally, we’d like to give a shout-out, in this season of thankfulness, to our volunteers who have over many years, put the “go” in continuing library services. These are likely the folks that have assisted you with checking in and out library, materials, handled phone calls, answered questions, have shelved the books, and otherwise have just made you feel at home. Efforts much appreciated.

And, of course, the Friends of the Library, the volunteer organization currently headed by Maureen Paque that serves as a community resource as well as fund-raising group for the library.  Fund-raising without overhead that goes directly to the library facilities and services that you enjoy here at the library. Great job, guys.