5.4 LIBSR 01-28-20205.4
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To: Elk River Library Board
CC: Robbie Schake, LSC
From: Brandi Canter, Lead Patron Services Supervisor
Date: January 15, 2020
Reciprocal Registration Pilot at Elk River Library
Late in 2019 Karen Pundsack, GRRL Executive Director, started conversations with Carla Lydon, Director of East
Central Regional Library, about how our libraries might work together to help each other's patrons register for
library accounts. I worked with Robbie and some of her staff to come up with a possible procedure, and Carla
worked with her staff in Princeton, and the result is that on January 9 we processed our first new card for
someone who lives in our region and uses the Princeton library.
Building Repeat Usage with New Borrowers
We've done a lot of analysis in the last few years about our borrowers. Staff at Elk River and around the region
work very hard to bring in new borrowers — they do outreach events in their communities, come up with
exciting new programs, and collaborate with local partners like schools and assisted living facilities. In spite of
these efforts we are seeing downward trends in borrower and circulation numbers.
Recently we sent one of our Patron Services Supervisors to a Public Library Association training how to make
our physical spaces more inviting, accessible and user-friendly. We'll be sharing some of these ideas at a
regional training for LSCS in March.
This week we'll have a meeting of regional and front-line staff to talk about diversity and inclusion in our
library services. We have a wide variety of people attending, and the goal of our Executive Director is to come
out of this and future meetings with specific strategies regarding the collection, access, public service and
more. In addition, in 2020 we plan to have a workgroup that will specifically look at the issue of building
repeat users — in other words, keeping more of the library users we already have. Insights and
recommendations from this group will help inform our next Strategic Plan.
Finally, for a bit of fun we are also working on building an online book recommendation page so that patrons
can receive a customized list of 2-4 recommended titles to try. We're hoping to have this available before
summer.