COVID-19

Community Steps Up for Smiley Library

Demonstrating how important A.K. Smiley Public Library is to Redlands, dozens of members of the community pledged their own financial resources to save the Library from the most severe budget cuts in its 126-year history, raising $193,000 in two weeks.

“What an amazing testament to the people of our community who, rather than see drastic cuts in our Library’s hours and services, dug into their own pockets to keep it open” remarked Library Trustee Rosa Gomez. The gifts from the community, in concert with the entirety of the Library’s $126,000 reserve fund, make up the 2020 COVID-19 Emergency Fund needed to avoid many of the projected layoffs, if only for one year. “Fortunately the Library Board was able to cobble together additional reserve funds to contribute, but the challenge when you use one-time funds for recurring needs is that once they’re spent, they’re spent. We won’t be able to do this again next year,” Gomez continued.

“The Library hadn’t completely recovered from the cuts of the Great Recession, so the sudden 20% reduction from the City meant the loss of 16 positions and the elimination of 21 hours of service to the public,” commented Library Director Don McCue. “While this doesn’t fix everything for the upcoming year, it is a great help, allowing the Library to be open 48 hours a week instead of only thirty-five.”

“We’re confident that, as the City budget picture hopefully improves, the City Council will reaffirm its commitment to the Library by resuming the funding needed to preserve these important programs,” said Bill Hatfield, President of the Library’s Board of Trustees. “The Library is part of the soul of this community. When Albert Smiley gave the Library and park to the City of Redlands in 1898, it was with the expectation that it would be ‘faithfully and liberally sustained’ by the City. We, with the City Council, must continue to honor his vision and gift.”

An Important Message from Your LIbrary

As many of you are aware, the Covid 19 pandemic and the resulting effect on our economy has caused a severe financial crisis for government on all levels. The city’s proposed budget was released to the public this week and it includes extremely severe cuts to the library. Because of previous cuts, 98.5% of the library’s budget is committed to personnel. Accordingly any cuts to the budget will require reductions to the library’s employees. The current proposal cuts the library’s budget by $535,000. More than a dozen employees will need to be laid off which in turn will require a reduction in our hours of service to the public from the current 56 to 35 per week. Unfortunately, this will severely restrict our ability to provide services to our patrons.

All of the services at the Smiley of which we are so justly proud: One-on-one Adult Literacy tutoring; access to public computers and WiFi; services to young readers and young adults; access to print and electronic collections; and access to the magnificent local historical research of the Heritage Room and Lincoln Memorial Shrine, will be negatively impacted.

We have relied increasingly in recent years on our Friends of the Library support organization to provide funding for the library’s books and programming. The service hours reductions will also hurt the Friends ability to sell donated and deaccessioned books in their bookstore.

The Library board and the Friends of the Library are working diligently to advocate for restoring at least some funding to the Library which would save positions and hours of service. The City Council will be holding a special budget meeting next Tuesday morning. Although the public cannot attend thanks to Covid 19, the city is accepting accepting email comments about priorities until 5 PM on Monday evening May 11. If you are concerned about these cuts to your library, please contact your elected officials. publiccomment@cityofredlands.org.

Don McCue	Les Kong
Library Director	Pres., Friends of Library

Resilient Redlands: COVID-19 and Our Town

Photo by Steven Robles — Submitted to “Resilient Redlands: COVID-19 and Our Town”

As we navigate through these challenging times, we are reminded that we are living through an historic moment that will be analyzed by generations to come. The resilient spirit of the Redlands community has been apparent through acts of selflessness and generosity exhibited by people throughout the pandemic.

A.K. Smiley Public Library is embarking on a new project to document life in Redlands during the outbreak. Led by the Library’s Division of Special Collections, “Resilient Redlands: COVID-19 and Our Town” invites the Redlands community to share their experiences through photographs, stories, poetry, works of art, or anything that can be shared electronically that documents life during COVID-19. Your submissions will become part of the Library’s COVID-19 remembrance collection.

Share your experiences through the new “Resilient Redlands” portal that allows you to upload photographs, documents, and answer a few questions about adjusting to life in this time of uncertainty. If email is your preference, please send these items to the Heritage Room at heritage@akspl.org. To learn more or participate in this community effort, click here. In-person donations can be accepted by appointment only.

If you have any questions, please contact the Heritage Room at heritage@akspl.org or (909)798-7632.

Library offers new at home resources: April 6

In order to serve our many patrons who are sheltering in place, the AK Smiley Public Library in Redlands continues to expand its electronic resources available to anyone with a Smiley Library card. Through the end of April we will be offering access to the popular video streaming service Kanopy and Kanopy Kids. More than 30,000 popular educational and entertaining documentaries movies and educational videos from thousands of producers such as Criterion Collection, PBS, Great Courses, and Kino Lorber are available. In addition, extra copies of e-books have been made available through the Overdrive service. Both Kanopy services and Overdrive are accessible on our website www.akspl.org .

Although the building itself is closed during the ongoing Covid 19 crisis, every Wednesday morning at 10:15 AM join us online on Facebook Live as Ms. Pamela conducts preschool virtual Story Time, during which she will read fabulous books designed for children ages 4 to 6. Ms. Pamela will also be entertaining with her famous song stylings. https://www.facebook.com/YoungReadersRoomatAKSmileyPublicLibrary

Baby virtual Story Time is Thursday morning at 9:30 AM. Log onto Facebook Live to listen along as Ms. Christina and Ms. Ariel read some of the best stories designed for newborns to two year olds. Songs and finger plays are part of the fun.

Beginning Saturday, April 11 we will be offering a Spanish-language virtual Story Time to be viewed on our Young Readers Room Facebook page as well as on the library’s website. Ms. Maria will be reading popular Spanish-language books aimed at young readers age 6 and under.

If you can’t login live, all of our story times are available in archived formats on Young Readers Room Facebook page.

To help celebrate poetry month, join Ms. Pamela and her merry Poets as they demonstrate their poetry chops. Every weekday morning at 10 AM a new poem will be posted on our Young Readers Room Instagram Stories page. https://www.instagram.com/akspl_kids

Thank you for your ongoing support of Smiley Library and we look forward to seeing all our patrons in person in the future.

A message about COVID-19: March 16

The Library Board and Library staff, in consultation with City of Redlands officials, have been closely following developments associated with the COVID-19 virus. This afternoon Redlands City Manager Charlie Duggan declared a state of emergency in our community, www.cityofredlands.org. Part of that declaration includes direction that the A.K. Smiley Public Library and the Lincoln Memorial Shrine should close immediately until April 30. Although this is a difficult decision, the Library Board and I fully support the city manager’s decision. The health and safety of our patrons and staff needs to be our primary consideration during this challenging time.

Late fees will be waived for any material that is due between now and April 30. Nonetheless, if you are able to travel to the library, we request that you continue to drop off all library material (including DVDs) in our book drop. We are working on establishing an appointment only method of distributing books and DVDs to our patrons who are able to come to the library. Please check our website or Facebook in the coming days for information on this potential option.

For those who are unable to visit the library in person, we would like to remind you again about the library’s electronic resources which are available 24/7 from home to all library cardholders. Patrons can download eBooks or audiobooks available from Overdrive on your home computer, tablet or phone. If you have young children at home, BookFlix is a valuable tool. This is an online resource that pairs classic video storybooks with related non-fiction eBooks to encourage a love of reading and learning for grades PreK – 3. For those looking for a magazine to read without leaving home, check out Flipster, a digital magazine service with 18 titles for adults and children. Finally check our eLibrary tab for other electronic databases, including access to the digital version of the New York Times. The library’s website has full details, www.akspl.org.

Thank you for your support of AK Smiley Public Library. We regret the inconvenience caused by the necessity to temporarily close. Together we will get through this crisis and look forward to the day when we can fully restore our services.

Sincerely.

Don McCue
Library Director