The Grafton Public Library will be CLOSED on Saturday, December 23 and Monday, December 25, 2023 in observance of the Christmas holiday. No items will be due.
Please pick up museum passes for Saturday and Tuesday before the Library closes at 6:00 p.m. on Friday December 22.
The Library was open 23 days in November and had 4,467 visitors. The library was closed on Veterans Day (November 11) and on November 17 and 18, 2023, due to installation of spray foam insulation. We closed at 5 p.m. on Wednesday, November 22 for the Thanksgiving holiday and reopened on Saturday, November 25, at 10 a.m. with regular hours.
We offered 14 programs for over 30 attendees. We had 134 meeting room reservations for 344 participants. We hosted an additional 18 meeting room uses for staff use (photography, meetings, programs, etc.)
Eight incident reports were filed, including: an accidental triggering of the silent alarm, disruptive teen behavior, misuse of library resources in the Teen Room, a facility event, an unattended child, and first aid.
Administration
Debby Jackson took on many of the tasks left by the director in her absence. She also worked on scheduling and payroll, Weekly Reports, upcoming social media posts, and Board of Library Trustee tasks. As of the end of November, she is transitioning to her new position as Head of Teen Services. She helped to train Shannon Phelan to take over the role of Administrative Assistant for the library.
Eileen maintained the collection of periodicals, took care of incoming mail, and prepared bills.
Staffing
Several staff members cross-trained to take over new positions, including Debby Jackson as Head of Teen Services, Allison Cusher as Head of Technical Services, and Shannon Phelan as Administrative Assistant.
We recorded at least 17 low coverage instances (others may not have been documented due to short staffing) due to scheduled, earned leave of benefited staff, chronic understaffing in the Teen department, a vacancy in the Technical Services department (since filled by Allison Cusher), and staff out on leave.
The Director is taking an FMLA-eligible leave of absence through the end of the calendar year.
Budget
At the end of October we were at 47% of our budget for the 2024 fiscal year. 90% of those expenses attributed to contracted services billed annually at the beginning of the fiscal year such as Bibliotecha and CWMars.
Building
Assistant Town Administrator William Blake is overseeing building issues and had several meetings with various contractors regarding general maintenance as well as flood remediation.
Construction Update
Insulation has been replaced, walls have been repaired and painted, and flooring has been removed in the Children’s Program Room and Children’s Work Room. No definitive timeline has been provided for completion of construction activities.
IT Update
Staff are working on developing procedures for laptop in-library use.
Volunteers, Outreach and Partnerships
Crescent Manor BookWagon had seven participants, 22 check-outs and renewals, and five requests. We delivered 16 items to homebound patrons. We had seven volunteers who put in 8 hours of work.
Social Media
We have 1,036 followers on TikTok, 2,234 followers on Facebook, 825 on Instagram, 113 on YouTube, 430 on Pinterest, and 8 on Flickr.
Children’s Services
The Children’s Room staff has continued to work out of the Friend’s Café. Staff have adjusted to what has become our new normal, but it has been challenging. Children’s Room staff have continued to field near-constant questions and concerns from the public ranging from sympathetic understanding to frustration about the closure of the Children’s Room, our current programming hiatus, and the temporary suspension of the Friends of the Grafton Public Library’s book sale.
Due to ongoing remediation in the Children’s Room, we still don’t expect programming to begin again until the new year. Once construction has been completed, staff will need at least a week to set the room back up, unpack boxes, clean and organize, and set up workstations before we can welcome patrons back into the space. We need a minimum of 4 weeks lead time to plan and advertise any programs.
It seems likely that Community Rooms will be completed before the Children’s Room, so we will be moving into that space to allow the Friends of the Grafton Public Library to reclaim their space. Since the Community Room is larger and carpeted, we will be able to bring in a selection of toys and computers to add to the books we are offering. We will keep the layout flexible so children’s programming can also be held in the space.
Outreach programming continued with visits to NGES, Busy Bee, SGES, and Silver Spruce.
Teen Services
During the month of November, Allison C. (Head of Teen Services) spent about a third of her time cataloging materials for the library, since she prepared to take over the Technical Services position in December. One of the teen programs scheduled for this month (fabric gift wrapping) was cancelled due to the building being closed for spray foam installation. There were no attendees at our monthly Manga and Anime groups this month, and our D&D program reboot hasn’t taken off as expected. With Debby starting in December, this is a great time for the teen department to re-evaluate and try new things to better serve our population.
Borrower Services
Museum Passes
There were 42 museum reservations: 35 were picked up and there were 7 “No Shows.”
Circulation
We registered 64 new borrowers and corrected three accounts for Grafton patrons.
Evergreen
The CWMARS Users Council meeting on 11/14 included a preview of Aspen, the new public catalog that will be debuting in March 2024, and a list of upcoming trainings for administrators and front-line staff.
ILL
We made eight out-of-network requests; three were unfillable. We sent out five items to certified libraries.
Displays
Our main display for November was Native American Heritage Month. The four smaller displays were: Carnegie Medal, Warm Family Stories, Thanksgiving: Gobble Up a Good Book, and World Vegan Month. A graphic novel display was set up for National Author’s Day.
Programs
Sandhya hosted one daytime “Unplug with Art” program for adults on 11/14: eight people attended. She organized and hosted an evening Stencil Art program for adults on 11/13: ten people attended.
We had a department staff meeting over Zoom when the library was closed for construction on Friday 11/17.
Seed Library
The seed packets program has been closed for the season.
Reference Services
We recorded the following statistics for database uses: Gale 288, PebbleGo 0, Peterson’s 0, Transparent Language 1, Novelist 10, Ancestry 654, ComicsPLUS 4, Pronounciator 1, BookFlix 0, and Teachables 0. We had 93 adults and 2 teens record public computer use. WiFi statistics were unavailable. Staff placed 489 holds for library materials.
Heidi assisted with tech and reference questions as well as circulation and room reservations / check-ins and museum passes. She also hosted book groups, worked on collection development, program planning, PR, statistics and prepared for Grafton Celebrates the Holidays.
Eric assisted patrons with technology, reference, museum passes, room requests / check-ins and circulation questions. Eric ordered new books for the non-fiction collection, put out new non-fiction materials, planned for December staircase display, organized parts of the new and general non-fiction collection, watched training videos on Niche Academy while the library was closed for repairs, assisted with cataloging and technical services tasks, and worked on monthly statistics.
Displays
Eric made a “Meet Someone New” staircase display. Heidi made an “In Memoriam” end cap display for Henry Kissinger and a Gnomevember display to support the New England Botanic Garden at Tower Hill.
Programs
We held the following in person book discussion groups:
“Not Just for Young Adults” Book Discussion Group: Bittersweet, by Sarah Ockler.
Daytimers Book Group: Our Missing Hearts, by Celeste Ng.
GPL Mystery Book Group: The Ghost of Christmas Past, by Rhys Bowen.
“Reads Well with Others” Adult Book Discussion Group: The Kitchen Front: a novel, by Jennifer Ryan.
The “Inspirational Book Club” and Guided Meditation: Sorry, Sorry, Sorry: the case for good apologies, by Marjorie Ingall & Susan McCarthy.
Technical Services
Allison Cusher prepared to take over as Head of Technical Services at the beginning of December. Eric Lindstrom and Allison Picone cross-trained to provide uninterrupted service to patrons during the transition. Over 300 items were added to our collections in November.
Friends
The Friends of the Grafton Public Library book sale remains on hold as the Children’s Room continues to use the Friends Corner as their temporary collection location. The next Friends meeting will be posted to the Friends Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/GPLFriends
This week we circulated 1,685 items, received 538 items in transit, and sent 628 items. We requested 365 items and fulfilled 357 hold requests; registered 12 patrons for library cards; and added 54 new items. The most popular book this week is Miss Dimple Suspects: A Mystery by Mignon Franklin Ballard.
The library will be closed on Saturday, December 23 and Monday, December 25 and will reopen on Tuesday, December 26 with regular hours.
The Children’s Room and Community Room remain closed, and the Friends of the Grafton Public Library book sale remains on hold awaiting reconstruction. Book bundles and gifts are available for purchase at the library.
Children’s Room staff planned for how the Community Rooms could be used for a temporary Children’s Room. Reference staff hosted several book discussion groups, including: the “Reads Well with Others” Book Group discussion of “Elevation” by Stephen King; the Daytimers Book Group discussion of “The Winter People” by Jennifer McMahon; and the GPL Mystery Book Group discussion of “The Bone Orchard” by Paul Doiron.
The Grafton Public Library will be collecting pet food the entire month of December in memory of our friend, and frequent library visitor, Toto the Tornado Kitten. Drop off your donation before December 16th for holiday distribution. The Grafton Food Bank especially needs dry cat food and wet dog food. Pet toys are also welcome.
Toto and his human, Jonathan, have visited the library as part of our summer reading program since 2014. We are heartbroken and will miss Toto greatly!
The Library was open 25 days in October and had 6,752 visitors. We offered 21 programs for 1,615 attendees (see trick or treat totals). We had 121 meeting room reservations for 401 participants. We hosted an additional 23 meeting room uses for staff use (meetings, programs etc.) and filed 8 incident reports, including first-aid and a car over the curb in the parking lot.
The Library was closed in observance of Indigenous Peoples’ Day on October, 9, 2023.
GPL participated in Octoberfest on Saturday, October 14 and saw 275 visitors to the table who enjoyed discussing the library while having fun with temporary tattoos.
On the evening of Saturday, October 14, the Grafton Public Library hosted the Capital Campaign donor party. The event was a smashing success for Capital Campaign, yet a few concerns were raised regarding trustee conflict of interest and treatment of staff, and as well as Facility Rental procedures.
The Library opened at 2 p.m. on Thursday, October 19, 2023 due to staff development. Staff members had a chance to decompress, enjoy a craft that is being offered as an adult program, collaborate as a staff and work in departments. Breakfast and lunch were provided.
On Wednesday, October 25, we participated in the Friendly Trick or Treat event at the Town of Grafton Municipal Center sponsored by the Grafton Recreation Department and handed out rubber ducks instead of candy and greeted 215 people.
Throughout the day on Halloween, staff and patrons alike enjoyed posing and taking pictures in the life-sized Barbie box created by Children’s Room staff. Staff members dressed as various Barbies throughout the day. We had 100% staff participation in our costume theme which was a lot of fun and a boost to staff morale.
Halloween evening on October 31 brought 859 trick or treaters to the library where we exhausted our supply of rubber ducks, handing out nearly 1,400 rubber ducks between the two trick or treating events.
ADMIN No Interim Director has been named, yet Administrative Assistant, Debby Jackson, has assumed a great deal of the tasks left by the director in her absence and has a contract to be compensated for taking on additional duties per Town Administration.
Eileen maintained the collection of periodicals, took care of incoming mail, and prepared bills.
Debby worked on scheduling and payroll, compiled Weekly Reports, worked on upcoming social media posts, planned the Staff Development Day and Grafton Celebrates the Holidays, covered the Teen Room, and worked on Board of Library Trustee tasks.
STAFFING We recorded 21 low coverage instances due to scheduled, earned leave of benefitted staff, chronic understaffing in the Teen and Reference departments, and staff out on leave.
The Director will be taking an FMLA-eligible leave of absence through the end of the calendar year.
Cynthia O’Neil in Technical Services had her last day on October 27, 2023 as she accepted a position outside of the library. Her position was posted internally and is expected to be filled on a full-time basis by the beginning of December. In the interim, staff from Teen, Reference, and Borrower Services are filling in to prevent a lapse in service.
The 12-hour Children’s Room position remains unfilled with a permanent replacement since July 1. An additional Children’s Room staff member has requested to drop four hours from her schedule. Department Heads have spoken with William Blake who has approved posting two 8-hour positions in November and we hope to have them filled in early December as well.
BUDGET At the end of October we were at 47% of our budget for the 2024 fiscal year. 90% of those expenses attributed to contracted services billed annually at the beginning of the fiscal year such as Bibliotecha and CWMars.
BUILDING Assistant Town Administrator William Blake is overseeing building issues and had several meetings with various contractors regarding general maintenance as well as flood remediation.
CONSTRUCTION UPDATE Reconstruction was delayed throughout the month of October for various reasons. When the initial insurance claim was submitted, carpet in the impacted areas was intact. After the work ServPro completed, the carpet began pulling up off of the floor and cabinetry in the Children’s Program Room and the bench by the window had been removed and disposed of; it became necessary to reevaluate and submit an updated insurance claim to MIIA. Construction was further delayed by permitting issues.
We are still waiting for return of chairs from Tucker, they are repairing stitching issues on the upholstery of several chairs. Several wooden chairs from the Wheelock Historic Reading Room are in need of repair as well. We will be looking into whether they can be repaired by Maintenance or if we will need to contract services.
IT UPDATE Preparations are being made to begin laptop rollout. Heidi Fowler was tasked with piloting the program with one set of laptops on the second floor. The process was put on hold as the staff adjusted to the Director’s leave of absence. It will be revisited in November per request of the trustees and in light of the patron verbal altercation incident that occurred.
OUTREACH Crescent Manor BookWagon had 4 participants, 35 check-outs and renewals and 4 requests. We delivered 14 items to Homebound patrons.
Heidi attended the Special Grafton Historical Society tea on Saturday October 14th at which they had tea and decorated hats.
VOLUNTEERS We had 10 volunteers who put in 29.75 hours.
SOCIAL MEDIA We have 1,022 followers on TikTok, 2,001 followers on Facebook, 815 on Instagram, 112 on YouTube, 135 Twitter, and 430 on Pinterest. We have 2,150 subscribers on Constant Contact and a 70% open rate on emails.
CHILDREN’S SERVICES Due to flood remediation, the Children’s Room staff have continued to work out of the Friend’s Corner. Staff have been adjusting to the new work flow, but it has been a rocky transition. Children’s Room staff have continued to field near-constant questions and concerns from the public ranging from sympathetic understanding to frustration about the closure of the Children’s Room, our current programming hiatus, and the temporary suspension of the Friends of the Grafton Public Library’s book sale.
At this time the Children’s Room staff is planning to have programming begin again in the new year. Construction is expected to being in early November, and we anticipate it taking the whole month to complete the project. Staff will also need a week to set the room back up, unpack boxes, and set up work stations before we can welcome patrons back into the space. We need a minimum of 4 weeks lead time to plan and advertise any programs.
We are back in full swing with outreach programming and visited NGES and Busy Bee during the month of October. We have added Silver Spruce to our outreach line up and hope to schedule future dates with SGES.
TEEN SERVICES During the month of October we’ve seen a sharp decline in the number of teens stopping by after school. Although we get a regular core group of 5-8, it seems that the decline is due to increase in after school clubs and athletics. We are trying various programs and times to see what will bring in teens. We relaunched Dungeons & Dragons. It is a teen-led program that is being held every other Monday. There has also been a significant decrease in the number incident reports in the Teen Room which I believe is the result of having teens fill out a new behavior agreement, reminding them of behavior expectations, having multiple consistent staff members in the afternoon, and the overall decrease in large crowds that used to visit daily. We are happy to report that we are still a very popular destination on half days.
BORROWER SERVICES Museum Passes There were 43 reservations; 36 were picked up and there were 7 “No Shows.”
Passports
We are still not accepting appointments for Passports.
Circulation We registered 47 new borrowers and corrected 2 accounts for Grafton patrons.
Evergreen A patch was installed in Evergreen on 10/8 for features enabled throughout the month. Updates included online eCard renewal for patrons, eCards available for patrons from certified non-CW MARS Massachusetts towns, extended item renewals based on original due date instead of renewal date (except for overdue items), and combining the courtesy and autorenewal notices into one notice with auto-renewals processing two days prior to the due date.
Seed Library The Seed Library program has been closed for the season; seed donations have been requested from the community. Approximately 150 seed packets were donated by a local nursery.
ILL We made 5 out of network requests; 0 were unfillable.
Overdrive No significant news.
Displays Adult Services Our main display for October was Harvest of Horror. The 4 smaller displays were: Horror Books & Movies, Autumn Fiction, Stranger Reads, and Coffee and Cookies (celebrating International Coffee Day and National Homemade Cookie Day). A graphic novel display was set up for scary comics.
Programs Sandhya hosted one daytime “Unplug with Art” program for adults: 2 people attended. She organized and hosted the third and final session of the Diamond art program for adults: 9 people attended (and 2 registrants notified ahead of time that they couldn’t attend).
REFERENCE SERVICES Programs In- person book discussion groups: “Not Just for Young Adults” Book Discussion Group: The Downstairs Girl by Stacey Lee; Daytimers Book Group: Other Birds by Sarah Addison Allen; GPL Mystery Book Group: Artifacts by Mary Anna Evans; “Reads Well with Others” Adult Book Discussion Group: Under the Whispering Door by TJ Klune; and the “Inspirational Book Club” and Guided Meditation: 13 Things Mentally Strong People Don’t Do: Take Back Your Power, Embrace Change, Face Your Fears, and Train our Brain for Happiness and Success by Amy Morin.
Saturday Afternoon Knitting (Saturday, October 21st; 2pm-4pm).
Displays Eric created a “Harvest of Horror” staircase display for Spooky Season and Heidi set up an “In Memoriam” end cap display for Matthew Perry upon his passing.
Heidi assisted with tech and reference questions as well as circulation and room reservations / check-ins and museum passes. She also attended professional development, hosted book groups, worked on collection development, program planning, grant writing, PR and statistics.
Eric assisted patrons with technology, reference, museum passes, room requests/check-ins and circulation questions. Eric ordered new books for the non-fiction collection, put out new non-fiction materials, planned for November displays, set up new desk space, shifted the collection to make more space, did collection maintenance, monthly statistics, helped clear out the reference desk before it was moved downstairs, attended professional development and put out new non-fiction books. they also trained on Technical Services and Cataloging.
527 Staff-Placed Holds
We recorded the following statistics for database uses: Gale 684, PebbleGo 0, Peterson’s 0, Transparent Language 2, Novelist 9, Ancestry 701, ComicsPLUS 13, Pronounciator 3, BookFlix 7. We had 132 adults use public computers and 11 teens record computer use. WiFi statistics were unavailable.
Technical Services Cynthia O’Neil accepted a position with CWMars and had her last day with us on Friday, October 27, 2023. Prior to her departure, department heads and Debby met to discuss a staffing plan that would keep the department running and prevent a lapse in service for patrons. Allison Cusher (Teen), Allie Picone (Borrower Services), and Eric Lindstrom (Reference) all trained with Cynthia prior to her departure. The vacancy was posted internally and until it is filled, Allison C, Allie P, and Eric are working in the Tech Services office and any desk time this month is being covered by temps.
Tech Services added 729 items in October and deleted 247 items.
Friends The Friends of the Grafton Public Library book sale remains on hold as the Children’s Room continues to use the Friends Corner as their temporary collection location. Friends will be present at Grafton Celebrates the Holidays on December 3 to sell book bundles and other gift items.
The next Friends meeting will be posted to the Friends Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/GPLFriends.
This week we circulated 1,759 items, received 595 items in transit, and sent 677 items. We requested 421 items and fulfilled 297 hold requests; registered 13 patrons for library cards; and added 43 new items. The most popular book this week is Each Kindness by Jacqueline Woodson. We hosted 37 meetings in our conference, study, and tutoring rooms for 73 people, including Girl Scouts, as well as private work, study, homeschool, and tutoring sessions.
Make plans to join us for Grafton Celebrates the Holidays on Sunday, December 3 from 12-4 p.m.!
The Children’s Room and Community Room remain closed, and the Friends of the Grafton Public Library book sale remains on hold awaiting reconstruction to be completed from flood damage sustained in August. Drywall work began this week, yet we have no definitive timeline for completion of the project.
Admin
The director is on FMLA leave through the end of the calendar year. In her absence, there has been no disruption in services and every department is running along smoothly. Thank you to everyone who has been helping out during this time.
Admin staff managed communications and accounts.
Borrower Services
Borrower Services staff managed the adult circ desk, delivery, museum passes, the lobby, room reservations, and Automatic Materials Handling equipment. We assisted patrons, placed holds, managed out of network requests for materials, performed readers’ advisory, processed pending library card applications, administered the home delivery program, and supervised volunteers. Staff performed collection development activities, processed new materials, prepared materials and graphics for the monthly staircase and endcap displays, prepared for upcoming adult programming, and worked on the newsletter.
Children’s Services
Children’s Room staff continued program planning for the new year, reorganized and maintained the temporary collection, stored excess materials that were not able to fit on current shelving, lesson planned for December outreach programming, assisted patrons with hold requests and reader’s advisory, communicated with patrons, updated displays with seasonal items, began summer reading planning, continued planning a Children’s Room Grand Reopening party, prepared for GCTH programming, created seasonal room décor, presented two sessions of outreach storytime to Busy Bee Academy, met with the Teen Department, met with Tech Services, reviewed Children’s Room Library Associate applications, and fielded many questions about the Children’s Room closure.
Teen Services
Staff interacted with teens and provided supervision in the Teen Room during after-school hours and supervised volunteers.
Reference Services
Reference staff assisted patrons with tech, circulation and reference questions; ordered books for the adult non-fiction section; hosted the “Reads Well with Others” discussion of The Kitchen Front, by Jennifer Ryan and the Inspirational Book Group and Guided Meditation discussion of Sorry, Sorry, Sorry: The case for good apologies by Marjorie Ingall and Susan McCarthy; worked on statistics; and planned a December staircase display.
Technical Services
This week Allison started moving her office items upstairs in anticipation of her new role in Tech Services and worked on creating carts of replacement items for damaged items in the Children’s Room.
This week we circulated 1,777 items, received 353 items in transit, and sent 718 items. We requested 421 items and fulfilled 395 hold requests; registered patrons 18 for library cards, and added 94 new items. The most popular book this week is My Life in France by Julia Child with Alex Prud’homme. We hosted 31 meetings in our conference, study, and tutoring rooms for 101 people.
The Grafton Public Library was closed Friday, November 17 and Saturday, November 18, 2023 for installation of spray foam insulation. The Children’s Room and Community Room remain closed and the Friends of the Grafton Public Library book sale remains on hold awaiting reconstruction. Thank you to everyone who has been helping while the director remains on FMLA leave. Things continue to run smoothly.
Borrower Services
Staff managed the adult circulation desk, delivery, museum passes, the lobby, room reservations, and Automatic Materials Handling equipment. We assisted patrons, placed holds, performed readers’ advisory, and supervised volunteers. Borrower Services had a department meeting via Zoom; a staff member attended the CWMARS Users Council meeting on behalf of the library; and an evening Stencil Art program and a daytime “Unplug with Art” program were hosted for adults.
Children’s Services
Staff began program planning for the new year, especially Summer Reading! Placed book and materials orders, reorganized and maintained the temporary collection, lesson planned for November & December outreach programming, updated displays with seasonal items, began planning a Children’s Room Grand Reopening party, provided 9 preschool outreach Storytime programs to local preschools, selected replacement flooring for the CR Program Room and Work Room, created room décor, reached out to YFCP to reschedule Friday’s Young Scientists program, met with NGES’s Media Specialist, and assisted patrons.
Teen Services
Staff supervised the room and held sessions of Dungeons and Dragons and Anime Club.
Reference Services
Reference staff assisted patrons with tech and reference questions, ordered books for the non-fiction collection, and hosted “Not Just for Young Adults” Book Group discussion of Bittersweet by Sarah Ockler.
Technical Services
A big Thank You to: Allison (Teen Services), Allie (Borrower Services), and Eric (Borrower Services) who continue to take shifts in Tech Services cataloging new books and putting them into circulation for patrons until the vacancy is permanently filled.
The Grafton Public Library will be closing at 12pm on Friday, December 15th for professional development. The Library will be open from 10:00am-12:00pm on Friday, and will reopen on Saturday, December 16th at 10:00am for normal operations.
We will be closed on Friday, November 17 and Saturday, November 18, 2023 for installation of spray foam insulation in the areas that sustained flood damage. Due to the airborne chemical nature of the material, it is required that the building be unoccupied on those days.
