Library Overview & History Update, 2011 Mission Statement:
The John Trigg Ester Library (JTEL) is a membership-based community library located in Ester, Alaska. It is a member of the Alaska Library Association, which is affiliated with the American Library Association. Operations and Maintenance The library is located at 3618 Main Street on the Ester Village Square, in the lower level of Frank Therrell and Amy Williamson’s two-storey red and white rental cabin, and is open every day of the week, from 9 am to 9 pm. The library has an office at 2922 Parks Highway in Studio #2 at the Annex, and owns a gazebo on Village Road across from the Ester Post Office. The property on which the future library building will stand is at 474 Village Road, up the street, across from the Malemute Saloon. The JTEL functions on an honor system. Members check items in and out of the library by themselves. Volunteers maintain the library and office, catalog books, serve on the board of directors, and help with fundraisers. The library has no staff. Facilities report Ida Lane Clausen Gazebo Ida’s son Galen Garwood is working on a short movie about her, and photos and other information from him were used to create a page in her honor at the library website, www.esterlibrary.org/aboutidalane.html. We held a work party on July 31, 2011 to complete minor details on the gazebo named in her honor: installing and staining ceiling trim; attaching, sanding, and varnishing interior shiplap trim around the windows; building a small bookshelf; and weeding the roadside. The only remaining items needed to complete the gazebo are two more stained glass windows and the dedication plaque for Ida (which has been designed but not yet sent to the engraver). A garden of rhubarb and other perennials is planned for summer 2012. Office The JTEL business office is located in studio #2 at the Annex, 2922 Parks Highway. Its rent, $300 per month, is offset through sponsorships solicited at the annual meeting. Sponsors from the 2010 meeting included: Carey Brink, Nancy Burnham, Andrea & Roy Earnest, Carla Helfferich, Deirdre Helfferich, Phil Rulon, Monique Musick, Tripp & Judie Triplehorn, and Susan Willsrud & Tom Zimmer. The office hosts board and committee meetings, is used to store library business records and sales items, and acts as a library annex, with books and movies available for checkout. Some library equipment and furniture is also stored at the office. Library The main library is housed at 3618 Main Street and is maintained by volunteers: Carey Brink, Roy Earnest, Deirdre Helfferich, and Jan Ohmstede kept the library clean this year, taking extra boxes of books away, shelving returns, sweeping, and generally straightening and tidying. Movies, which have in the past had a separate card catalog, are slowly being put on the same system as the books, that is, with a card pocket attached to the cover of the DVD or video itself (sometimes on the exterior and sometimes on the inside front cover). Property report The ECA transferred title to the JTEL for the two parcels (originally purchased from Malemute Inc. through the ECA) on February 16, 2011. The JTEL now owns this land and leases a third parcel from Gail & Larry Flodin. The terms of the lease contract were fulfilled on July 18, 2011 when we achieved charitable nonprofit status, proof of which was delivered to the Flodin’s lawyer, Eugene Belland. The JTEL is now awaiting title transfer for this last piece of property. Together, these three parcels encompass the entire east side of Village Road, from the Old Nenana Highway to Main Street. Until the library is built, we are required to pay property taxes on these parcels, which came to $336.77 this fiscal year (not including the Flodin property, on which the gazebo stands). The library’s collection The JTEL collection includes books, audiobooks, movies, jigsaw puzzles, and a few board games. Approximately 5,000 items are on the JTEL’s shelves, with approximately 7,000 more in storage or being held for donation by community members until the new building is constructed. The library has a cooperative arrangement with Calypso Farm & Ecology Center’s Resource Library. Cataloging for Calypso’s library is complete; cataloging for the JTEL is incomplete and ongoing; as of this report, 1,900 items have been entered (1,475 in the JTEL, 425 in Calypso’s library), up from 1,453 in 2010. Holdings and entry statistics may be viewed on line at www.librarything.com/catalog/esterlibrarian. Volunteers are needed to assist with cataloging. Programs report This year the Board created a Program & Activities Development Policy & Plan to guide planning, creating, and operating programs. The first program proposal submitted under this policy was for the Growing Ester’s Biodiversity seed library program, which is an ambitious and multifaceted program that will be launched in early 2012 and will feature subprograms, activities, and events specific to the overall program. Programs need not be this complex, however, and could be as straightforward as a book group or a single workshop. The policy purview includes fundraising events as well as educational activities. Library members are encouraged to take an active part in library services and events, and to develop and submit proposals for programs, activities, and events at the JTEL. The library had two programs and one proposal during FY 2011: Library Lecture Series The lecture series continued for its second year, kicking off in March 2011 with a lecture by philosopher Walter Benesch on the Panchatantra, a collection of Eastern fables and morality tales; and following with Thorsten Chlupp on Passiv Haus design (and the mode in which the new Ester library will be designed and constructed); Jennifer Jolis on the fate of the people of Attu Island during and after World War II; Matt Reckard on an updated and expanded history of Ester; and concluding the season with a presentation by Neil Davis on Alaska’s oil royalty/taxation structure. Some portions of these and previous lectures may be found through links on the program webpage, www.esterlibrary.org/lectures/librarylectures.html. Grantwriting Workshop Deirdre Helfferich and Susan Willsrud conducted a two-part workshop on applying for grants, held April 2 and 9, 2011. The library’s capital project was used as an example with which attendees could practice grant finding and application skills. The workshop was offered for free and represented a ~$200 value per person. Fourteen people participated, and eight attended one or both of the two in-person sessions (although not all were able to make it to each session). The presenters plan to conduct another such workshop in spring 2012. Growing Ester’s Biodiversity: This proposal served as a model of how a fully fledged program proposal might appear under the new Program & Activities Development Plan & Policy. This major program, which was accepted by the JTEL board at its August meeting, will include subprograms, events, and activities under its umbrella. (The first such will be an information table at Food Day on October 24 at the UAF Wood Center.) Deirdre Helfferich is the program coordinator. Briefly, the program’s purpose is to: 1) create an accessible and affordable source of regionally-adapted seeds; 2) educate library members and the public about biodiversity, cultural traditions concerning food and agriculture, Ester and Alaska’s agricultural history, and related topics; 3) build community awareness and connections through partnerships between the library and local nonprofits, food and horticulture businesses, gardeners, educational institutions, and others; and 4) strengthen the JTEL’s connections to its community, membership, and volunteers; broaden the relevance of the library to area residents; set an example for other libraries and organizations; and support and supplement the other educational programs of the JTEL. More on this program is available online at www.esterlibrary.org/programs/geb.html. History The JTEL was founded in 1999 as a reading room and changed its name to honor local storyteller and model boat builder John Trigg in 2000. Four years later, the library joined the Ester Community Association, a nonprofit founded in 1941 and dedicated to enhancing the life of the community. The decision was made to purchase land for a library building, and fundraising began in 2005. The library’s three annual fundraisers have grown to become community events: The Lallapalooza & Book Bash (an auction and lasagne feed in spring), the LiBerry Music Festival (a music festival and pie contest in late summer), and Readers on the Run (a fun run with magnetic poetry and costume contests incorporated, in late fall/early winter). The latter two fundraisers increased their revenue earnings significantly over those of calendar year 2010. (See the FY 2011 Fundraiser Report.) Area business owners and individuals have given generously over the years. Land on Village Road was purchased in spring 2006 from Rick Winther (Malemute, Inc.), and a few months later another parcel on Village Road was leased from Larry Flodin, on which the Ida Lane Clausen Gazebo was completed in 2010. In fall 2008 the JTEL and the ECA decided to separate so that the library could focus on its mission and obtain federal nonprofit charitable organization 501(c)(3) status. Since the 2010 annual meeting, the board has concentrated on fundraising, the building design, and fleshing out organizational procedures and policies. The library has secured two grants (an $80,000 Designated Legislative Appropriation for library construction and a $35,000 borough matching grant) and qualified for the Community Revenue Sharing Program, which will provide ongoing funds (variable from year to year but in the realm of $6,000-$9,000, depending on legislative appropriations to the fund, number of applicants, and interest earned on the principal). (See more on these grants under Capital Campaign, Grants & Appropriations.) We recently completed a community survey (see Marketing & Publicity Report) both for purposes of alerting the local population to the library’s existence and to gain feedback and ideas on fundraising, programs, equipment, operations, the building design, and the site. The results were very helpful, and we thank everyone who took the time to fill out our survey. The aggregated results of the anonymous survey were shared with the Ester Community Association. The Present and Future The board is refining its long-term business and operations plans and gearing up to obtain the remaining funding needed for its capital campaign. Organizational work is mostly completed. The library is also working on a cooperative arrangement with the University of Alaska Fairbanks Interior-Aleutians campus Construction Trades & Technology Program to provide the opportunity for CTT students to fulfill their practicum requirement with the JTEL’s building project. For the next two years, depending on funding, the library will be under construction. The board will be refining the structure of the organization and its day-to-day operations and policies, seeking capital funding and refining its long-term support plan, overseeing the construction of the building and the transfer of the collections once the building is complete, staffing the library, and developing new programs. The five-year period from 2009 to 2014 will likely be the most intensely active in the library’s history. Community feedback and participation will be essential. (See JTEL Goals & Objectives.) Click on the image below to see in a new window.
Committees and Working Groups The Friends of the Ester Library is a loose-knit group of active volunteers (primarily present and past board members) who participate heavily in fundraisers and other library-related events. Fundraisers and the capital campaign are publicized on the FEL website, www.esterlibrary.com. It is not a separate organization, but may form the basis for one in the somewhat distant future. An inter-organization group, the Ester Nonprofit Group, has been formed but not yet met. It will consist of two representatives from each of Ester’s four major local nonprofits: Calypso Farm & Ecology Center, the Ester Community Association, the Ester Volunteer Fire Department, and the John Trigg Ester Library. The purpose is to coordinate fundraising and other work that affects the community so that each organization can support each other and thereby benefit the whole of Ester. The proposal was brought to the Calypso, the ECA, and the EVFD by the JTEL in the hopes of avoiding competition and having better communication between the four organizations. The JTEL has continued its practice of providing short informational activity reports to the ECA during the spring and fall general meetings, begun when the JTEL was a committee of the ECA between 2004–2008 and continued as a courtesy after the two groups separated. The board still has only two committees (see reports above). At its September meeting, to reflect the broader and long-term fundraising needs of the library, the Capital Campaign Committee’s name was changed to the Grants & Fundraising Committee. The board anticipates that eventually a third committee focusing on programs may need to be formed, but at present the two are sufficient. Draft organization and policy charts are available for comment on line at www.esterlibrary.org/orgchart.html.
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