Library Board - Regular Meeting

Louie? Here. Colvin? Here. Johnson? Kim? Naker? Yang? Here. Chair Jones? Here. For present three absent, three being excused. The first item on the agenda is the approval of minutes, minutes 26-23, library board minutes for 7 or July 8th of 2026.

Great, I will take a motion from Council Member Coleman to approve the minutes. Is there any discussion? Seeing none, all those in favor say aye. Aye. All those opposed?

Five in favor, zero opposed, the minutes are adopted. Actually six. I'm sorry. We had two people come in. Six in favor, zero opposed, the minutes are adopted. The next item on the agenda is the staff report, staff report 26-154, newcomer services.

And this item, we actually will be laying over to August 7th. The presenter ended up not being available to present today, so I'd like to take a motion. Are we getting feedback in here? We are. Okay. Okay. Hopefully that will get fixed. So I'd like to take a motion from Council Vice President Yang to lay the staff report over to August 7th. All those in favor? Oh my God, why am I saying August? October 7th. Thank you, Director Harmon. To lay this over to October 7th. All those in favor, say aye. Aye. All those opposed?

Six in favor, zero opposed. The staff report has been laid over to October 7th. The next staff report on the agenda is staff report 26-156, strengthening libraries as spaces of belonging project.

Great. I'd like to welcome Rebecca Ryan to present this topic for the Melling Grants. Thank you.

Thanks, Library Board Chair Dross and council members. This will be really brief. You will hear maybe some specific activities from Adriana when she's back in October. This relates to our upcoming agenda item about the melon grant. I'm really happy to say that the Friends of the Library was granted a million dollars by the Melon Foundation this summer for three years. They've also granted a similar amount for a similar timeline to Hennepin County Library. And, you know, I really appreciate my colleagues across the river and excuse me, I'm excited for more of our staff to develop some collaborative relationships between our library systems. These are pretty broad goals of the grant. As you can see, they very much reinforce the work that we do every day in the library. We want to build and restore trust in public institutions like the library. We want to continue to directly address and provide services that address people's learning and information needs, provide safe and welcoming spaces and programs, and address widening learning gaps like literacy. And some of the specific project activities that we are just embarking on will be expanding our community services team with an additional Spanish-speaking community specialist and an additional specialist to work with our Kenya or Karen community. We will support existing library materials that have proven really high demand and high value for some of particularly the digital literacy work that we do. That would be solid some adult basic education materials on the North star digital literacy assessment, this will also support. One FTE of a library safety specialist in 27 and 28 to continue kind of to bridge the gap that we have between our butt and general funds. SUPPORT PUBLIC FACING PROGRAMS LIKE FAMILY LITERACY NIGHTS WHICH WE'VE BEEN EXPERIMENTING WITH SUCCESS IN SOME OF OUR LIBRARIES. AND THEN SOME OF YOU MAY KNOW OR REMEMBER THAT WE HAVE PUBLISHED CHILDREN'S BOOKS IN KEREN AND ENGLISH BEFORE AND WE WILL BE EXPLORING THE POSSIBILITY OF DOING SO AGAIN WITH THESE FUNDS. AND THAT IS ALL I HAVE ABOUT THIS GRANT FOR NOW. SO HAPPY TO TAKE QUESTIONS IF THERE ARE ANY.

Questions or comments? Council Member Johnson.

Yeah, no questions. More so of a comment of just that's a really big deal. So I'm glad to, you know, I'm glad that we're talking through, but I do want to echo and kind of double down, if not on just the significance of that investment, both for here and Hennepin County. So that's a really welcome surprise and also very excited about it and just simply wanted to say that's a big, it's a big deal and incredible opportunity investment in our St. Paul Public Libraries, and so I'm glad to hear about that. It's really exciting, and so just didn't want that to pass through just with no conversation or acknowledgement of how big of a deal that is.

Council President Baker.

Thanks, Chair Jost. I share my colleagues' enthusiasm and congratulations. I just want to ask, note, as it looks like you're talking about hiring staff with a one-time funding source, And we're talking right now about shifting six full-time staff that we funded with a one-time funding source onto the general fund to please be thoughtful about that. And I want to make sure that we have an exit strategy that doesn't rely on the general fund and that also doesn't compromise the quality of the services that we start to provide or people's livelihoods.

Any other questions? Oh, I will say we're about to post for those positions and they're clearly noted in that posting as a three year grant funded position.

Yeah, this is really, really exciting. It's a huge investment in our libraries. And I'm just really appreciative to see what this is going to mean for our libraries. I mean, all of the additional services and the expansion of more languages and our community services team. And we also know how critical our library safety specialists are, especially with us opening the new library this year and additionally having We have so many more renovations to our libraries. I'm excited to see that this will help support those goals. Any other questions or comments?

All right.

Well, thank you so much. This is really exciting.

The final item on the agenda is a discussion item, Resolution Public Hearing 26-178, amending the financing and spending plan of the St. Paul Public Library Agency in the amount of $920,000 to reflect multi-year transfer of grant funds received on the behalf of by the Friends of the St. Paul Public Library from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.

So this is basically the action item that is approving the funds that we were just talking about. I will take a motion from Council Member Johnson to approve this item. Is there any discussion? No. All right, all those in favor say aye. Aye. All those opposed?

Six in favor, zero opposed. Resolution has been adopted.

Great, well that brings us to the end of our agenda. I'll say a couple of things here quick. We did open the Hamlin Midway Library a few weeks ago and it was amazing. We're so excited about the library. It's incredible. If you haven't been there yet, please come by. And I'm excited that the library budget address will be at the Hamlin Library this year, next Thursday at 2 o'clock. So another opportunity for people to come and check it out if they haven't already. And then at our next library board meeting is when we will be receiving the budget presentation from the director. um so thank you again everyone for your participation today and with nothing else to come before us we are adjourned