LIBRARY REPORT DETAILS COVID-19 CHALLENGES
A day after Yolo County announced library staff working on site are eligible for the COVID-19 vaccine, Woodland Public Library leaders reflected on the challenges of the past year.
The Woodland Public Library closed down on March 15, 2020 due to the coronavirus pandemic in what “proved to be a challenging year for us all,” according to the library’s 2019-20 annual report.
The report was presented to the Woodland City Council during their meeting on Tuesday, which was held via Zoom.
Noel Rodriguez, president of the Library Board of Trustees, introduced the 12-page report that detailed everything from improvements to the physical space to the number of programs and visitors.
“The library like the rest of our community has had to adjust to COVID and the regulations which were enacted for the public’s safety and our staff safety,” Rodriguez said. “During this past year as COVID began to develop into a serious matter, our library quickly adapted to the safety requirements, used innovative solutions and found a way to meet the community’s needs.”
One example of this involves the library’s Square One makerspace, which supplied materials to make face masks and shields early in the pandemic when these items were in short supply.
Library staff and volunteers went to work making them for the community.
Rodriguez reported that Square One provided 1,200 fabric face masks and 200 face shields. These items were delivered to local hospitals, the Woodland Police Department, local businesses and farmworkers “to meet a critical need in our diverse community.”
Library staff also had to become proficient in social media and shift their programs to a virtual environment. Library Services Director Greta Galindo highlighted the importance of social media during her presentation. Not only was social media a way to keep the public informed, but it also was a way to keep library staff connected and their morale up during a turbulent time. Much of this involved posting videos to the Woodland Public Library’s Instagram page featuring the library’s cat, Henrietta, or staff wearing inflatable costumes and riding around on roller skates.
The new virtual programs included story times, paint nights, craft programs, and performers all through the library’s website and social media pages, according to the report.
Galindo emphasized that she wanted to make sure any virtual program offered was doable, meaning that the library would provide kits for things like crafts and science experiments instead of assuming people had materials at home.
She also highlighted some other parts of the report, noting that before the pandemic hit the library was on track to have its “most refined year” in some time.
Galindo credited her staff in their ability to adapt and come up with ways to engage with the community from a distance.
While COVID-19 cases have eased enough to allow some indoor activities at the library — patrons can make an appointment to browse the stacks, use a computer or visit Square One — there was a silver lining to being closed for an extended period.
Galindo reported that the library received a muchneeded facelift.
“We re-carpeted the entire library,” she said, smiling. Staff also replaced many of the older, metal shelves with shorter wood ones that allow more natural light to enter the building.
Asked whether this change reduced the library’s collection, Galindo noted there was a lot of shifting but no books were removed. The report also noted updates to indoor and outdoor lighting as well as the library’s security cameras.
Galindo also reviewed various statistics, which reflected the pandemic’s effects on certain programs and outcomes.
“It’s true that some of our numbers don’t compare to last year’s numbers, but this is not a year that should be looked upon strictly by the numbers,” Rodriguez said. “The library staff worked through a very dynamic time that required many changes in how our services were delivered.”