READ With …….

Start with your kids and then each other and then with yourself!  PPL is grateful to be among the founding partners of the newly formed ConnectEd effort in Portland.  We plan to have a major impact in the effort to increase Pre-K reading in Portland. We won’t be in it alone as we will be working with terrific partners like the United Way, Portland Schools and other organizations.  But it will take passionate individuals as well who believe deeply that reading is the greatest gift that parents, schools, libraries and society as a whole can bestow on any one individual.

There will be many ways to reach children, families and individuals in the City.  Our commitment is to utilize everything in our power -  our staff, volunteers, deposit collections, branches and our new bookmobile  - to infect this City with a reading bug.  The bookmobile funding plan, design and service strategy has been three years in the making.  It arrived today after a 4 day cross country drive from Las Vegas looking like an old friend who is ready to lend a hand.

JUST READ and JOIN US!!

A more interactive PPL

The digital presence of PPL is one of the three “environments”, along with our physical facilities and soon to come bookmobile, which we need to master.  Each environment has its own unique set of dynamics and user experiences.  It is no secret that our current website is …. Well, to find the right word … packed.  It is hard to navigate and, although there are plenty of great resources on the site, it doesn’t do a good job helping us serve our many different users.

In the next two months, we will be finishing some projects that have been months in the making which will radically change our digital profile and how we will relate to our users.  Several new platforms will be unveiled that will make it easier for us to connect with our users, expand library collections and make it easier to find information.  In June our new website will be rolled out.  We have been working with VONT, a local web marketing firm, for over a year to integrate social media, such as Facebook, more effectively within our site and to incorporate new tools, such as BiblioCommons.

 

BiblioCommons will provide a new library catalog experience, allowing users and staff to share lists of items and provide much better access to our collections.  Finally this spring our digital collections will begin to utilize the Digital Commons platform.  You will be able to use search engines to explore collections such as Maine News Index, Children’s Theater of Maine, Portland Press Herald Still Film Negatives, Maine Jewish Oral History Projects, Casco Bay Weekly and many more.

We are very grateful to the Sam L. Cohen Foundation for their support toward these projects.

Coming to You On All Kinds of Roads

In the spring of 2010, the Library publicly put forth its Portable Library concept.  The effort included a number of elements but the basic idea was to transcend the physical locations of the library by going to where the people are working, living and recreating.  The Portable Library Team includes, among other things, deposit collections at places like the METRO waiting room on Elm Street, coffee houses and a bookmobile. 

The bookmobile, funded in part by support from Key Bank, will arrive in Portland sometime next week and will be on the road in April.  It will bring books, programs, internet access, training and the ability to sign up for a library card to locations throughout Portland.  Many folks have fond memories as children of PPL’s full scale bookmobile from 1972 to 1994.  

Here’s to a new set of memories and a lot of fun!

Creating a kinder and better Portland

Public libraries are increasingly being recognized and encouraged to employ to full advantage their ability to offer safe spaces for civil discourse and civic engagement.  To that end, this spring PPL will begin a two year civility and civic engagement initiative that will include public forums addressing issues of broad community interest, drop in opportunities at the Library and a series of smaller community conversations to discuss the aspirations that people have for our City.  The two year effort is funded through a generous grant ($48,000) by the Emanuel & Pauline A. Lerner Foundation of Portland. We are very grateful for their faith in PPL.

As we begin implementing aspects of the project, our Business & Government Team will provide more details and ways that citizens can participate.

In the context of visions for Portland, we are supportive of Mayor Brennan’s effort to “create a kinder community that's inclusive, diverse and has a role for every resident to play.”  

 

One spot culture!

Portland Public Library is the city's cultural center serving 666,000 visitors annually at four locations through a unique combination of print, media and digital resources complemented by robust internet access, lectures, classes, exhibits, programs and performances for all ages.

Yesterday and today are prime examples of what that statement means.

Last night approximately 200 people attended Maine Poet Laureate Wes McNair’s launch of his memoir The Words I Chose: A memoir of family and poetry at a special Brown Bag Lecture in the Rines Auditorium.  Tonight’s First Friday Art Walk looks to repeat the December Friday Art Walk, which welcomed over 1,000 people to see the Edward Gorey exhibit Elegant Enigmas and hear electronica music (Algorithm) and dance (Portland Ballet), both inspired by Gorey’s art work. Add to those events the annual Four Freedoms poster project by King Middle School students and well, you get the picture.  

At PPL this evening, February 1st at 6:30 PM, you can hear Tom Allen, our former congressman, launch his new book Dangerous Convictions: What’s Really Wrong With the US Congress, see the Prints: Breaking Boundaries exhibit and get a dose of Shakespeare in our Atrium at 6:00 PM through the interpretation of the Naked Shakespeare troupe.  (Check out our website for more information!)

Nothing quite like it so please come by for a taste of it all.

Help Build Some Great Maine Libraries

The history of public library funding in Maine has been overwhelmingly reliant on local funds.   Except for an occasional state bond referendum providing limited funds, there is no money for public library construction and there is no money to assist public libraries in their operations.  Past support, such as a .10 per capita state support, have long since disappeared so that library funding is provided by a combination of  local taxpayer  and private funds.   I suppose, given the tremendous use and affection for public libraries in this state, you could describe the situation as either perplexing or shameful.

That might be about to change.  The Maine Library Commission gained permission to include the Maine’s public libraries as a check off option on state tax returns.  All funds will be dedicated to the Maine Public Library Fund.  So hopefully the hundreds of thousands of Mainers who use their public libraries might take a moment and contribute and then reap the benefits of their generosity. 

For more information, please check out the Maine State Library's web-site at http://www.maine.gov/msl/tax/index.shtml 

Not a World Apart

Last Tuesday we at PPL had one of those days that inspires, energizes and reminds you why at a very, very basic level librarianship is a noble and true profession.  Maria and Esther, librarians from Busia County, Kenya came to visit us for the day.  They are on a mission to create a community library that will become the cultural center for their community and to positively impact every aspect of community life.  The day was jam packed and as these things often go we learned much more from them than I suspect they learned from us. The day was initiated by Eva Kaplan, a Portland native now working in support of Maria’s Libraries.  We face similar challenges differing only somewhat in scale.  The qualities needed to meet the challenges were the same: enthusiasm, intelligence, sense of purpose and humor. 

But Eva and the crew can recount their trip much better than I, but we were honored to have hosted their visit and privileged to learn from them. http://mariaslibraries.org/2012/10/23/maria-and-esther-visit-portland-public-library/