Library Love Fests

In the past week I've had the pleasure of attending four meetings that turned out to be Library Love Fests.
The first was the Hanover County Planning Commission meeting at which the Commission approved the Conditional Use Permit Amendments on the new Mechanicsville Library. Members of the Commission praised the building plan and the services we provide. They also talked about the recent action they took to approve a plan Conditional Use Permit for the Rutland development which includes a proffered site for a new Atlee Library.
The 10th Annual Library of Virginia Foundation Literary Awards on Saturday night was a high energy celebration. There were literary stars David Baldacci, Lee Smith, and Claudia Emerson, award winners Tom Wolfe, Adriana Trigiani, and others, movie star Wallace Shawn, who accompanied fiction award winner Deborah Eisenberg, three Virginia governors, Governor Baliles who really does read books, Governor Holton, and his son in law, Governor Tim Kane, whose introduction of Lifetime Award Winner Tom Wolfe was brilliant. Mr. F and I saw lots of good friends and colleagues, ate well and had a very good time. Virtually every one of the authors who spoke that night talked about the important place of libraries in their lives and work. A Library Love Fest indeed.
Sunday's Love Fest was more low key, but equally enjoyable. The Friends of the Goochland Library's annual meeting was a gathering of the wonderful people in Goochland who support the Library. They were very pleased to learn that their long time president, Pat Atherholt, has been awarded the Virginia Library Association Trustee Award.
Finally, on Wednesday night, the Love Fest moved to the Hanover Board of Supervisors meeting. The Board gave final approval to the Mechanicsville Library Conditional Use Permit Amendment and awarded the construction contract for $3,725,000 to Evans Construction, Inc. Board members love the design and expressed their gratitude to all the Library Board and staff members who helped with the project. Anne Cross, Brenda Meadows, Steve Hartung and Dottie Stone were in attendance from the Library. Greg Lukmire, our architect, and Steve Herzog of Public Works and Jim Totty of the Purchasing Office were there too. Jim will complete the contract with the contractor and we will then get started building. The Supervisors also completed the approvals for the Rutland development library site and talked about the great need for a new library to replace our rented Atlee Branch.
All in all, a good week!

October duties

Every October I create the Library's budget proposal. We are really just beginning to spend this year's budget and it is disconcerting to think about how much money we will need to run the library beginning next July - that is July 2008 - and throughout the next fiscal year. But, it must be done - and so it is. The Library Board will discuss it at their next meeting and then I'll edit it for each of the four counties - Hanover first, in October, the others later.
The Mechanicsville Library project is the other big October project - really not much work - we have done the hard part of the planning - now we are going through the exercises of democracy - attending Planning Commission and Board of Supervisors meetings for approval and permissions. Soon the real fun of construction will start and for at least the beginning of the project we have enough money for the construction.
After reading "The Historian" for the horror readers advisory group - I'm clearing my mind with "Travels with Herodotus".
The roses and gardenias are still blooming and the real delight of my garden right now is the charming vine, love-in-a-puff.