Libraries across the county reflect on five years of independent operations

For many involved, this wooden anniversary is an opportunity for both reflection and celebration.

Rita Radford, Riddle’s current director of library services, was a 17-year veteran of the Douglas County Library System when all operations ceased in 2017. Three months later, Rita and an army of volunteers reopened the Riddle City Library.

“Everything changed,” she said. “Just because we’re an independent library now, we do everything on our own when before the main branch handled most things.”

Like most of the re-opened libraries, Riddle has the support of the city inasmuch as they provide some funding and handle building and utilities costs for the library. Everything else is funded through grants and fundraisers.

While there have been innumerable challenges to opening each independent branch, there has been some benefit to self-reliance.

“The best part of being an independent public library is getting to be in charge of ourselves, rather than being ran by people that might not be involved with the library directly,” Rebecca Rard, Winston library director, said. “We know what we need and what our community needs from us.”

Rard became involved with the Winston Library after it reopened. She started by volunteering a few hours a week, but was named library director when the library received public library status last year.

“There were a lot of people that were very upset by the libraries being shut down — myself included. We came together as a community and worked hard to achieve something that we believe is vital to our city,” Rard said. “Five years ago we re-opened running on donations and volunteer-power and we’re still here — I think that says a lot about our community’s appreciation for their library and the services we provide.”

None of the libraries could make it without the help of volunteers. In fact, the volunteers in Sutherlin handle everything but the administrative duties, which are left in the hands of library director Pat Lynch.

“We have one part-timer, but the library pretty much runs on volunteers,” Lynch said, a reality shared by most of the libraries in Douglas County. “It’s the community, and the volunteers particularly, that have made the success we’ve had possible. I really can’t say enough about them, they are a tremendous group.”

Sutherlin is the second largest library in the county. They have been steadily working toward sharing their resources with smaller libraries in the area, such as Glendale, Winston, Yoncalla, Myrtle Creek, Oakland and Canyonville.

Everyone in the county has free access to Sutherlin and Winston library cards and the many physical and digital resources the C. Giles Hunt Memorial Library and Winston Library have to offer.

Some libraries will be hosting celebrations in honor of their five years of independent operation. Sutherlin hosted a volunteer appreciation event Thursday, honoring the nearly 16,000 hours of volunteer work put in by dedicated community members.

“Running an operation as diverse and complicated as the library with a volunteer staff is a challenge, but I have never seen a group of volunteers pull together as well as this group,” said C. Giles Hunt Sutherlin Library Foundation president Carleen House. “The special talents of various individuals are encouraged and have promoted the progress of the library. Many of those initially involved have stayed with the library due to the pride in the accomplishment of a successful venture and the pleasant working environment.”

Near the end of May, Riddle will host a celebration and in June, Canyonville will also reflect on its journey with an open house and book sale.

Not all libraries see this as an opportunity to rejoice, however. In Drain, the staff and volunteers of the Mildred Whipple Library would rather honor their community than remember the time when they almost lost such an important piece of their community.

“This is not an anniversary we want to honor, honestly,” North Douglas Library District Librarian Miriam Sisson said. “We had a huge birthday party the first year of our reopening ... but we are not celebrating this. If we wanted to celebrate something, it would be our community’s willingness to vote yes and our community’s willingness to support libraries with their tax revenue. Without the county having closed the library, I’m not sure that our community would have known it had that in it.”

As bright as the past five years have been for most libraries in our communities, there are still numerous struggles. Funding will always be an issue and more volunteers are always needed at all locations. Myrtle Creek volunteer Robert Heilman praised grants from organizations such as the Douglas County Library Foundation for keeping libraries open. Myrtle Creek isn’t eligible for public library status due to lack of paid staff, hours open and a formal declaration of support from the city. This has made obtaining state and federal grants nearly impossible.

“We can’t stop looking for solutions ... the closure of the library system brought many challenges to overcome, and determined individuals and groups joined forces to keep our doors open. I continue to be amazed by the creative solutions that have kept all the branches open,” Canyonville Friends of the Library President Carol Hilderbrand said.