New statistics have the St. Albert Public Library and its executive leadership feeling like they're on the right track, as the number of memberships, items loaned, and in-person visits are all trending upwards as of the end of 2023.
Library CEO Peter Bailey said memberships totalled 15,882 coming into 2024, which is 16 per cent more than 2022 and five per cent more than 2019.
“We're really happy with the numbers coming back from pandemic days,” Bailey said. “Membership is absolutely crucial.”
Bailey suggested a membership total just shy of 16,000 also doesn't accurately reflect the number of library users, given many of these memberships represent families that all use one library card.
The number of physical and digital items loaned from the library didn't increase as significantly as memberships, as just 344 more items were loaned in 2023 than 2022. In 2023, a combined 761,245 items were loaned.
When it comes to in-person visits, the library saw an 18 per cent in jump in 2023 at both the downtown and Jensen Lakes locations combined, compared to 2022. The Jensen Lakes branch library location saw a 37 per cent bump last year.
This increase was especially encouraging for Bailey, because one of the library's long-term goals is to have both locations serve as community gathering places.
“For years we said the library is more than a building, it's more than the books, [because] as a service organization we're important for the things we do as well as the things we are,” he said. “Libraries have always been, historically, a source of support for democracy and having people be able to understand each other better, and right now, in this moment, libraries can and should be playing that role in bringing community together.”
“The numbers of people coming physically to the library, for programs, for story time, those are the numbers I'm really excited about.”
Bailey said increased in-person visits point to the success of some of the library's new programming, such as the monthly tea and bannock gatherings that take place on the last Tuesday of the month, as well as existing programs such as the Summer Reading Game.
“The big accomplishment in 2022 going into 2023 was the renovations to the main floor of the downtown library,” Bailey said, which allowed the library to create what he called the “community living room.”
“It's become a real physical space for formal things like tea and bannock, our Métis and Indigenous gatherings monthly, which have been a spectacular success with 75 people at one of those meetings,” he said. He added another example of a group using the living room is the Wednesday night “knit-lit” group, which sees folks get together to knit and chat books.
With 2024 more than halfway done, Bailey said all things point toward continued success for the library this year.
“I think it's about building on the successful things we have been doing and looking at opportunities to increase them,” Bailey said. “We just launched our Summer Reading Game, and last year was a spectacular success, as we had about 3,000 kids registered for the program. So, they ran over a million minutes of reading during the summer, so we're hoping that the 2024 Summer Reading Game will be equally or more successful.”
“We're very excited about the road ahead.”
