LIBRARY MUSINGS: Fabulous Fridays and Mother Goose coming to GFPL
By Grand Forks and District Public Library
I’ve got some very exciting news to start off 2014 – we are getting rid of overdue fines! Our Board of Directors passed a motion to do this for a one-year trial period, starting January 1, 2014. There are a few public libraries in Canada who have eliminated overdue fines, and I spoke to each of them to see what their experiences had been. They all mentioned that they have not seen an increase in overdue items (and in one case there was even a decrease), and that both staff and patrons were much happier with the change. Fines can also serve as an obstacle to many patrons, preventing them from returning to the library. We eliminated overdue fines on children’s materials last year, and the response from both staff and patrons has been very positive.
What about the money, you might be asking yourself? Well, overdue fines only make up 0.7% of our annual revenue, so it won’t have much of an effect on our budget.
And one important thing to note: we are eliminating overdue fines, but we will still ask that you pay for damaged or lost items.
Enough about that – here’s what’s going on at the library:
Movie Night
Come to the library on Thursday, January 9 at 6 pm for our NFB Film Club. We’ll start off with “The Composer’s Dream”, a short (7 min) film on award-winning composer Howard Shore, who has done film scores for “The Hobbit”, “Twilight”, “Lord of the Rings”, and dozens of other films. The main feature is “A Drummer’s ‘Dream” (85 min), a rare assembly of the greatest drummers in the world, including rock, jazz, latin, and soul. All ages welcome – popcorn will be served!
Fabulous Friday
We’ve got another Fabulous Friday coming up – it will be on January 10 from 1 – 3 pm. We’ll have our usual array of board games, crafts, puppets, snacks, chess, and our Xbox 360 Kinect. All ages welcome, but children under 7 must be accompanied by a parent or caregiver.
Lego Club
Get creative with our enormous bins of Lego at our monthly Lego Club on Friday, January 17 from 1 – 3 pm. As with all library events, children under the age of 7 must be accompanied.
A Honkin’ Good Time
That’s right – Mother Goose is returning to the library. Join our two talented leaders on Saturday mornings from January 25 to March 22 from 10:30 am to 11:15 am. For children ages 0-3 years (and their siblings of any age) and their parents or caregivers.
