Another Reason Why Bronxville Is A Great Place to Live - A Real Sense of Community & Education!
This article from LoHud.com about the financial needs of the Bronxville Public Library, and the wonderful response by the residents is a prime example of the priority residents place on education. While every one’s budget is tight in this economy, residents still find it important enough to donate money or a book to improve the library and their children’s education. Bravo! Want to help out? Contact Womrath Bookstore through their website: http://www.womrath.com/
Bronxville library group helps fill shelves with community support
Randi Weiner
rcweiner@lohud.com
BRONXVILLE - Laura Eckley had been on her job as director of the Bronxville Library for just about a month when she was faced with cutting $175,000 from the $1.27 million 2009-10 budget because of the bad economy.
“Ninety-five percent of the budget comes from the village,” Eckley said. “It’s been a very, very bad economic time and the library, like every other department … had to cut.”
She trimmed staff, reduced operating hours and slashed her materials budget by $30,000.
Magazine subscriptions to Young Rider, Vanity Fair, Science Illustrated, Motor Trend, and Smithsonian, along with more than two dozen other periodicals, were allowed to run out.
The library didn’t order extra copies of hot reads like Dan Brown’s “The Lost Symbol,” “Crazy Hair” by Neil Gaiman or “Pride and Prejudice and Zombies” by Jane Austen and Seth Grahame-Smith.
That’s when the Friends of the Bronxville Library stepped in with two programs that have restored many of the books and magazines cut from budget.
Both projects rely on help from the greater Bronxville community, including Womrath Bookshop and Bronxville Middle School, and both exceeded expectations, said Sarah Normand, Friends president.
“We’ve had a fabulous response to both and we’re feeling terrific about the community response,” Normand said.
“This is a particular area of need for the library, and we’re particularly grateful to Womrath and the schools,” she added.
The magazine program rose out of the Bronxville schools’ annual seventh-grade magazine drive, a fundraiser used to pay for an annual student trip to Williamsburg, Va.
This year, a note went home with the student magazine worksheet Sept. 29 asking people to consider donating a subscription to the library.
The appended wish list was filled in less than a week.
“We cut 35 magazines out of our stock,” Eckley said. “We’ve gotten about 15 of them - all of them that were available on that list.”
A longer-term project is called Buy a Book, Give a Book and it is coordinated through Womrath Bookshop.
A sign in the book store tells people that they can purchase a book for the library from a wish list kept on hand by owners Gene and Wanda Sgarlata.
People can support the library and the local bookstore and get a tax deduction at the same time, they point out.
Under the program, patrons of the bookstore choose a book from the list, order it and pay for it.
The book is delivered to the library, and the donator gets a special book plate and the gratitude of the recipients.
The first wish list of about 30 books is mostly exhausted, and the library now has given Womrath a new list.
Interested customers can choose fiction, nonfiction, children’s books and young adult books, among others.
Sgarlata said customers are choosy about what they’re willing to purchase, so he likes to make sure they have a large selection.
“We’ve sold a lot,” he said.
For the first list, “we filled the whole thing within 2[0xff] weeks and we had to ask them for another (list). It’s done quite nicely.”
Womrath’s is auctioning a first-edition, signed copy of “Moonwalk” by Michael Jackson, with proceeds to support the library. Bids are being accepted at the bookstore through Oct. 31.
For a list of books still needed by the library, to make a bid on “Moonwalk,” or for other information from Womrath, contact the book store at womrathny@yahoo.com.
