Greenfield library sees increase in usage over last year

Greenfield Public Library Director Danica Clayton gave an annual library report to the Greenfield City Council at their Tuesday, Oct. 8 meeting

She said that in many regards, it has been a good past year at the library. There were several positive areas of progress Clayton was able to report on.

“The State Library of Iowa’s report is due in October, so it works best [to come this month] since I have statistics in hand to give you guys a look at what fiscal year 2023-24 looked like,” Clayton said.

According to Clayton’s report, 12,158 library visits yielded 17,992 checkouts of the library’s 32,810 items, an increase of about 2,000 checkouts from the last year. That can include books, cake pans, audiobooks, movies, puzzles, hotspots and more. There were also 4,967 digital checkouts, for a grand total of 22,959 checkouts for 2,144 patrons.

Library visits were up 8% from the previous year, but Clayton thinks that number is still rebounding from the pandemic.

Adult fiction was the reading genre that accounted for 30.6% of circulation, which is the highest of any. The ‘other’ category took up 22.3% of circulation.

The library is able to offer wifi and serve other technology needs patrons night have. They had 2,039 uses of library computers, which was nearly double the usage of the previous year. There were 5,507 wireless internet sessions, and library staff often answer technology questions for patrons.

The library held 218 programs on and off site with a total of 2,140 attendees. Programs ranged from weekly events such as Toddler Time to senior technology classes, which are held in conjunction with Connections Area Agency on Aging. Collaborations were made for programming with Connections AAA, Adair County ISU Extension and Outreach, Adair County Conservation, Parents as Teachers and Senior Life Solutions at Adair County Health System.

Outreach initiatives were trips taken to the local daycare, certain volumes were selected for use at the local nursing home, a senior day was participated in at the county fair, and more.

Highlights from the fiscal year include a baby area that opened, a small meeting room opened, a Friends of the Library group started up again, Wonderbooks and more take home bags were added and Transparent Languages was added to the library’s online resources.