[Los Angeles Public Library at City Hall 1905]LAPL is the largest public library system in the nation. It has seen increased use, from 14 million to 16 million last year.
Holmes talked about LAPL’s growth in the last 20 years. In 1986 a fire in the Central Library destroyed 400,000 books. This led to a project to restore the building and gardens (the original gardens had been paved over for a parking lot in the 1950’s). It also started a 317 million dollar branch library construction program. LAPL involved each community in the design process and each library building had a unique architect. In this way each library was individual and fit the needs of the community. The construction program doubled the size of the branch libraries and added some new branches as well.
Bringing computers and technology to people with out home access is another important role of LAPL. According to Holmes, about 1 million people do not have home computers. The computers terminals are some of the most used services in the library. Recently all the branches have wireless access as well.
Holmes emphasized involving the community in public libraries. She talked about reaching out to teens as well as children and adults and the importance of getting community support for projects.
In other news, the student groups are planning a return of Career Fest beginning at the end of this quarter! We all have a lot of work to do before then, but it looks like we’ve got some really interesting talks planned!
(photo taken from Library of Congress Prints and Photography Online Catalog)
Posts
