City Librarian Community Message

(Updated July 14, 2020)

July 1, 2020

Dear Friends,

Next week, Decatur Public Library will be open on Monday, July 6 through Thursday, July 9 from 9 a.m. to 8 p.m., and Friday, July 10 from 9 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. The library will be open Monday through Friday those same hours throughout the month of July. We hope to bring Saturday hours back sometime in August.

Yesterday, June 30, we were open regular hours and saw about a 30% increase in foot traffic over the other days we have been open. We had about 450 patrons in through the course of the day. We have been experiencing similar traffic today and will be open again tomorrow.

Patrons will be able to:

• Request materials from other libraries
• Donate books
• Browse, checkout and return (outside drops only) materials
• Pick up holds
• Get a reference question answered.
• There will be limited computer access and
• There will be limited seating.

There will not be:

• Local History Room access (but the archivist can be contacted via email)
• On-site programs or meetings.

Services:

We would like to introduce our new Decatur Public Library Intern, Jessica Hill. She will be supervised by Mary Garrison, who has been providing social services for the library this past year. Jessica will be available for some one-on-one work with patrons in need of social work services as well as working on a grant for a permanent social worker at DPL. Please help us achieve this goal by taking the social services survey here. Jessica can be contacted at socialworker@decaturlibrary.org

Please feel free also to return items at any time to our outside drop, just to the right of the automated book return. We are quarantining all materials returned for a minimum of three days, which means that no one will touch these items for 72 hours and often times longer. You will not see the items come off of your account during that time, but if you are a Decatur Public Library cardholder, we will never charge you a late fine.

Curbside service has dropped off with most patrons choosing to come into the building to pick up their hold items. We will, however, continue to offer curbside on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday from 10 a.m . to 2 p.m. This means you can place holds/requests for physical items held at our library and we will arrange a time for you to pick the items up in our parking lot without ever leaving your car. Please see more details here: Curbside Pickup

The fact that these services are limited is temporary. We will work to expand services and hours a little at a time until things are back to normal. Our number one concern is the health and safety of our library users and our staff. We miss our patrons, we miss serving our community—and we are looking forward to seeing you all and serving you again in a way that maximizes your safety.

Donations:

The Library has begun receiving donations of used books on behalf of the Friends of the Library. Donated books can be put on the old loading dock to the north of the main entrance. If you have a large quantity of books and need help unloading them, please call the library at 421-9712 to schedule a time when someone can meet you at the door with a cart and help move the books from your vehicle into the library.

Summer Reading:

Don’t forget that the 2020 Summer Reading Challenge is underway. This is our first ever all online Summer Reading. The response thus far has been terrific. So far, we have 690 readers who have logged over 200,000 reading minutes. Decatur Public Library has reading challenges for young adults and grown-ups as well. You can find all the details here: Summer Reading Challenge

Thank you for remaining loyal DPL users—

Sincerely

Rick Meyer

City Librarian

Decatur Public Library