Library brings back bookmobile

After about a 10 years absence, the Guernsey County Public Library brings back the bookmobile.

The new bookmobile, which arrived at the Crossroads Branch earlier this month, is a 23-foot customized sprinter van that is handicapped accessible with a wheelchair lift.

The library currently has a staff member who is working as a bookmobile clerk and will be the one driving it the majority of the time. Other times, Katherine Grewell, user procurement coordinator, will be operating it.

Library staff is hoping to have the new bookmobile fully operational sometime in January.

"We are getting stuff ordered and getting things ready to go and all kind of organized right now. Hopefully, by January we will be on the road and hitting all of our community stops," Grewell said.

The circulation inventory on the bookmobile will consist of books and movies at first, with hopes of adding technology items to it, as well. Technology could include a couple of the new Chromebook laptops the library added to its circulation recently. 

Items going on the bookmobile will be all brand new items.

"It will be all new. It will be a brand new collection," Grewell said. "We are in the process of getting that all ordered now. It will include adults, children's, and large print materials plus all the tech that we were talking about. That will all be new for the bookmobile."

Items not on the bookmobile, but can found in one of the branches or libraries that are part of the Library Consortium can be requested to be delivered by the bookmobile.

"We would like to have some of our Launchpads on there," Luke Bentley, assistant director, said. "I think what you will see is basically the collection of the bookmobile, we hope, will be sort of like a smaller version of any of our other branches."

Grewell believes the bookmobile will be huge for Guernsey County communities.

"Right now, our library service is essentially in the Cambridge and Byesville areas. The rest of the county, we're not able to serve in that same way because we don't have any physical locations there," Grewell said. "So that is a huge number of residents who don't really have regular access to a library. We are hoping that the bookmobile will supplement that."

The bookmobile has removal racks so the library can customize the items to target the needs of where it is, such as schools or senior centers.  

Grewell noted that the library can't put a physical location everywhere but that they can pretty much take the bookmobile everywhere. The library plans on servicing Quaker City, Senecaville, Lore City, and Antrim, she said.

Grewell said the library really wants to hit all of the areas in Guernsey County around Cambridge and Bentley said they would like to blanket the county as they can, so the bookmobile may have stops in places that are even smaller than the smallest towns. 

"We want to make sure that we have that geographic coverage to where if you are a resident of Guernsey County, we want to try and make library access to you as convenient as possible," Bentley said. 

The library staff is currently working on the bookmobile schedule and determining the frequency of which it will make stops. Once established, a schedule will be posted online and in the branches.

The new bookmobile and the collection on it are paid for by Library dollars.

According to Bentley, the library has been saving for this purchase since the library director Michael Limer started in that position with the library. 

"We just managed to spend appropriately with library money moving forward so we were able to do that," Bentley said.

The library does not yet have a total cost of the bookmobile since they do not yet know what the cost of inventory will be. 

The bookmobile will operate the same as any physical library location.  Any patron in good standing with a library card will be able to check out items. Technology products will still require the use of an adult card. Those who do not have a library card will be able to get one from the bookmobile, which Bentley describes as a library on wheels. 

Bentley also noted that once the bookmobile is out on the road, it will be a moving library hot spot and will be outfitted with equipment that will allow those near the vehicle when it is stopped to log onto Wi-Fi. 

"We want to give as much of a library experience on this vehicle as possible," Bentley said. 

Bentley also noted that long-term planning for the bookmobile could involve library programming run from it.

"We are very open to adapting to what the community needs, so we don't pretend to know everything right now but we would love to open that dialogue as to what the community needs and how we can fill that," Grewell said.

The library is interested in hearing comments and suggestions from the community on what items and services they would like to see offered and where they would like to see the bookmobile stop.

Those who have suggestions can call the Crossroads branch at 740-432-7536.