 Hello everyone, I'm James Milan. Welcome to this episode of The Library Show. It has been a little while but we are delighted to be back with our library director Anna Lytton and also joined by Adam Del Molino from the Library's Board of Trustees. You'll also notice we're not in our normal space at the Robbins Library, which gets a lot of attention in town. Instead, we are at the Fox because there's some big news coming up related to the Fox and we're going to be talking to Anna and Adam about that today. And we are just really, really happy to be here. Anna, thanks so much for opening the Fox for us this morning. Yeah, it's always a pleasure to talk about my favorite topic, Arlington's public libraries, and it is really a true pleasure to get to be here today to speak with you specifically about Arlington's branch library located here at 175 Mass Ave, our booming and bustling location in East Arlington. Yeah, so I mean, I think we should remind folks that obviously, I said, you know, somewhat glibly, but nonetheless, appreciatively at the beginning, Robbins does get a lot of attention. There it is, right in the center of town. It's an architectural marvel and it's just lovely to be in, et cetera. But the Fox has been an important part of this community for a really long time and the last 10 years, it's quite dramatic from what I understand. So just tell us a little bit about like Fox, you know, circa 2020, 2013 and versus Fox now. Yeah, I'm going to begin and then I'm going to have Adam fill in some of the details. The first of all, I do want to let you share with you that the Arlington has been serving the community in East Arlington through a location here, a branch library in East Arlington since 1917. In 1917, the Fox branch library first opened as the location in what is currently, which was then the Crosby School, which is now the building right around the corner from us. Library services opened up on Mass Ave in 1961 here in this location. And this library has been an important piece of the community fabric here since then. In 2013, this library was much smaller in many ways than it is now. It was open many fewer hours. We served many fewer people. At that time, we were serving about 20,000 visitors a year and we were open three days a week. At this stage here sitting here today in 2023 in this library, we serve about 80,000 visitors a year. We are open five days a week. We have visitors from young children who are here to play. We have increasingly remote workers and students who are using our space to find a quieter space to work during the day or get out of their homes. This library, every single time I come in here, it is busier than the last time I was here. And it is truly exciting to see the growth in visitors, to see the way that this library is able to meet really the growing needs of the community for community space and library services in East Arlington. Yes. I mean, those are stunning numbers. I mean, 80,000 just try to break that down by week. It's quite impressive. And what I would say is obviously a lot of changes in the last 10 years at the Fox. A lot of changes coming up. So let's talk about that. So we are here specifically today to talk about a new project for the Fox. And, you know, I'll just I'll let you guys decide who's going to speak to what part of that. Yeah, I'm going to let Adam speak first. Really, how this isn't a new project. We have been thinking about ways to improve this building for a while. Yeah. So I've been on the board of trustees since 2008. And one of the things that I think is really important to think about is back in 2017, 2018, we engaged in this project as part of the board of trustees and we used some money to do some planning called reimagining our libraries. And when we did reimagining our libraries, we really want to take a look at both the Fox and the Robbins branches. One of the things that's really important to think about here at the Fox branch is the inaccessibility of this library. You can't go into this building without taking one step up to get into the building. You cannot get access to the downstairs floors of the building. There is not an elevator. So it is wheelchair inaccessible. As a parent of a child with disabilities, I know the importance of being able to provide services in a library for all, no matter where we are located, whether it's at the Fox or the Robbins. And it's really, really important that we kind of engage in this process. In 2017, 2018, we put that process together. We had surveys. We did listening sessions. We did a whole raft of work. We worked with an architectural firm. I think it's called Anom now. And we worked with Anom and they put together a really beautiful picture of what this building could potentially look like with all those accessibility features that we need for this location. Unfortunately, the pandemic hit and things changed a little bit and it caused us to reprioritize as a board and working with our library director in terms of what the best needs are and how we should kind of pursue additional funding for all the kind of the capital needs and projects that we need at both libraries, but really truly focusing on the opportunity that we have here with the Fox. So I'll let you handle the rest of it. Yeah. I just really want to thank Adam for being so clear about the accessibility issues here. Libraries are for all. Libraries need to be for all. And this library, this space right now, here that we are sitting in, is not accessible. And we are leaving out members of our community. That is never the goal of a public library. We are always looking to create opportunities for every single member of our community. So this year in 2023, the Massachusetts public library construction program opened their grant round and invited libraries in Massachusetts to submit a letter of intent to apply for the Massachusetts public library construction program grant funding, which can fund up to 50% of eligible costs for construction projects. This is a wonderful opportunity for us to revisit the conversations that we had in the 2017-2018 period, as well as pull in new information that we have learned about how library use has changed, how our community has changed in the post-pandemic period. We all know so much is different about how residents are using libraries, about what community needs are. Even the demographics of our community have changed in that time period. The town submitted a letter of intent in April and we are now working on preparing our grant for application in May of 2024. In the library recently contracted with a library planning, a library space planning consultant, Anders Dahlgren of Library Planning Associates has been working with us to help us understand and define community needs so that we can think about what the library spaces, collections, and services are that best meet those needs. We are really focusing all of our conversations right now in what community needs are. What does the community need, aside from an accessible building? What kind of spaces is the community looking for in East Arlington and how can we best develop those spaces? Anders held a number of focus groups in November. Right now, community members, we hope all community members take the opportunity to fill out our survey that's available at robbinslibrary.org. Anders will be back conducting some open public forums to help him learn even more about community needs in Arlington in January. Those public forums will be on January 11th and January 13th here at the Fox Branch Library and as well as a Zoom opportunity on January 17th. Right now, we are again, we are still learning. We are learning about what our community really needs and how we can design a building, services, and collections that best meet those needs. Yeah, I mean it really is exciting to think about the possibilities, but I also want to reiterate what you said, Adam, about the, you know, just the absolute dire essential importance of making this ADA compliant because you said that, you know, you can't get downstairs and downstairs is where the bathroom is among other things, right? So this is, that's just not a tenable situation, I understand. Yeah, and I think, I think too, the thing to remember is we've got a great planner here and Anders, he's done libraries in Cambridge, he's done libraries in Boober and you know, we did a really rigorous process to put together in our working group that we do with members of our community to really think about and choose the best and select the best person for this job. We also are really lucky to have a great leadership from the town. You know, not only I would say from our municipal leaders, but also from our state legislative delegation, really been helpful. They've set aside some money in the capital needs program that we can be able to access to help build that, you know, that, that elevator that we're going to need for that accessibility issue. So that's money that's kind of set aside, we can use it when we, you know, have the plan, when we have the funding from the town, when we have the planning grant, hopefully from the Mass Board of Library Commissioners, and if we can put all that together, it's really exciting about what we could do here at this location. Okay, so I just want to make sure that I understand what you just said well and that our audience does also. What you're saying is that our legislators have been responsible for coming up with some money, so as to be able to install an elevator here in this library, whatever the rest of the place looks like, whatever the other changes that are made, that is going to be available and also funded in that way. So Arlingtonians don't have to worry about that in a sense. Yes, correct. That's obviously really good news. So it seems like the project itself or whatever happens here at The Fox will have to both kind of observe guidelines that are, that come from other places, you know, again, in terms of ADA compliance, etc., so you'll have to have that as a track. But then you're also extremely, as you just articulated, and you're very, very interested in the rest of it being the result of changes that the community informs you that they want to see or things that they elements in the new library that they want to see. So let's just go back again for a second and do this kind of before the pandemic and after the pandemic comparison, because I know from getting to talk to you, getting to talk to Andrea, your predecessor in the early days of the pandemic, etc., that there were just changes in processes, changes in services, etc. What are some of those things that you guys know are going to need to be maintained here at the library because they're so popular with people or will be, you know, something something new that the library hadn't offered before? Yeah, I'm going to start. This library is such an important area for young children. This is a great early childhood resource here. We are sitting here in the children's area at the Fox Branch library. And when this library is open, this is always a bustling area where kids are engaging with those early literacy skills that lead to a lifetime of learning, lead to academic success and to be honest, lead to a lot of fun in your life. Reading should always be fun. Libraries should always be fun. So those core services will always be here. We also see such a need for additional workspace for community members. And one of the changes that I have seen in the pre and post pandemic years here is the way that our adult seating has been used. Before the pandemic, we would not see adults sitting in chairs and tables and working for hours at a time. There is now not enough space for adults who want to find a work area in East Arlington here at the Fox Branch library. So looking forward to finding ways to better meet that really identified community need at this stage. We've been talking about the inaccessibility of our lower level. Community space is so important in libraries. There are very few places in communities where a community group can have a meeting, can bring members of their community together to talk about the issues that are important to them. And library community spaces have always been important in that. So making sure that we are able to offer community spaces that meet the needs for community groups to hold their meetings or their knitting clubs or whatever it might be is truly important here. Making sure that we have those spaces. But if those spaces aren't accessible, it's they're not actually we don't really have them if they're not accessible. And we don't want to presuppose it too. But we also do want to think about the fact that too like we want these spaces to be available when the library isn't open to one of the things that's always been a challenge. If you've ever tried to especially I remember going back years ago now is that you wanted to get the keys to the library to the space downstairs. You had to go through the recreation department and get the key from the recreation department in order to be able to use that space after hours when the library wasn't open, right? So how do we think creatively about you know providing accessible entrances and exits to be able to get into the building as well so that it is truly accessible when people want to be able to use it especially early morning hours later evening hours. And I don't want to presuppose anything from the information that we're going to be collecting. But that's just kind of one example like I mean we're in a library here now that as I said I think previously historically we think about but it was on the verge of closure back in the early 2000s and now to have 80,000 visitors coming in you know per year is just it's a remarkable transformation and turnaround and we've been able to kind of work with the town to be able to bring in more resources to be able to provide the opening to the library which I think is really important. I do feel like I also have to quickly mention our incredible I like to call them our sweetmates. We are very lucky here at the Fox Branch Library to also be co-located with the Fox and Robin shop a resale shop that directly supports library services and operations. It is so interesting the way that we really work in synergy with the Fox shop. I'm sure so many of the listeners have experienced shopping at the Fox shop and we are looking forward to continuing that partnership going forward that that location really does work so well with our mission we are able to support the community in another number of different ways by continuing to build that relationship. And I have to say just echoing both of you that you know I've been living in the town for almost 30 years now raised our children here spent plenty of time in this room in those years but those were back in the lean years it's really true as Adam was saying this place was you know it was just underutilized and it just had that feeling of kind of oh it might just slip away and instead there's been this enormous reinvigoration obviously in tandem with East Arlington in general which is a very vibrant as we know part of our town at this point. So serve you know making this you know I don't know if it's going to be state of the art or if we want to talk about that kind of thing at all but with the changes that I'm sure are going to be possible under your guy's vision and under you know and with the these 50% you know grant help will help it really does seem like it's it's going to be right in line with the growth of this part of Arlington as well. Let me ask you about something I recently spoke to the director of our department of planning and community development for a DPCD update. Claire Ricker told me at that time that that there's also the possibility look that there's there's a consideration of the possibility of having possibly some housing added to this building as well obviously building up from the existing building. I know that that's all very speculative in a sense etc but I wondered if you wanted to speak to that at all as well. You want to start? No I think one of the things that's really important to think about is this is a library first project that we are here to work on the plans and the kind of the the kind of what we want to see in the vision of the future of the library here in Arlington again as we said a library for all that's really the kind of the critical most important piece. The town has been very fortunate to be able to engage with other folks to talk a little bit about potentially could we co-locate housing with this branch library that we have here right now. So that's a part of this process. What we're seeing across the country is a lot of folks are kind of utilizing and thinking about how can we creatively use the resources that we have particularly municipally owned buildings to build new facilities and to add to the housing stock in many of our communities. We're talking about the globe article this weekend that it basically says you know the West End branch library in the city of Boston is building a anticipating a huge facility with housing on top of their library. A really creative idea and approach. There's other libraries that have kind of gone down this road in Chicago and in other cities to sit there and say well what can we do here we have this piece of land we have this opportunity so we're going to take a look at it and the town wants to take a look at it and see what we could potentially do as part of this project but a really unique opportunity. I know there's a lot of conversations in the community about housing generally and it you know kind of engenders a lot of conversation and passion in people but we definitely think this is a good opportunity to consider you know what could we potentially do as well here with this great location that we have. I think we are so lucky to have Claire Ricker as our partner. We don't we are not housing people we don't want to build a lot of buildings. What we want to do is build wonderful library services collections and spaces and whatever happens I'm really excited that Claire has this opportunity to investigate the potential for co-locating housing but our real mission here is to think about the library space. We think about the what are we doing within the walls of the library and learning from the community about what they want to see within those walls. Adam said it so well this is a library first project no matter what happens no matter what Claire learns we are really looking forward to improving our library space here. Yeah and you were saying that you want to follow the guidelines that you know of community input basically and I know before we went on air that we were talking and you mentioned Anna that you've already had hundreds of comments you put the survey up and you've already had hundreds excuse me not comments but responses on that anything that you any any kind of themes that are emerging already over. I really want to pull out as I mentioned our space planning consultant Anders Dahlgren was here in November every single time he talks to someone he says he just hears the community passion for this location and how much the Fox branch library means to the 80,000 visitors a year who come through the doors here and he works with libraries across the country and he just really says I see that this is a special location for the community. The Fox provides such a special space in East Arlington and we're just looking to continue making the space more special for our community here. This is a part of town with a lot of multifamily housing people here are living in the smaller footprint sometimes than in other parts of town and to have this true community living room where people can come gather see their neighbors connect with other people in town is it is such a gift to be able to offer that space to the community as well as our traditional library services of providing we circulated last year about 150,000 items from this location so that as well we are it is such a gift to serve the community through this location and I just continue looking forward to doing that even more effectively. Yeah I mean these are crazy numbers and really we talked about 80,000 visitors 150,000 items these are that those are like big city library numbers yeah no doubt about it yeah and we think about it we are what fourth in in in Massachusetts in terms of our use in our tenants of our program yeah our um we are the fifth highest circulating library leaving out Boston yes we can't cross out to Boston so we Boston out Arlington is the fourth highest circulating library in Massachusetts uh last year in FY 23 Arlington circulated Arlington residents checked out about 950,000 items from our libraries which is I would be plausible for a certain amount of that good I my goal is to get to a million let's circulate a million items in our libraries and this location is so key in that that the numbers of items that people check out from this library the number of times people put their holds to pick up their items from this library it's more convenient to swing in here than to come up to the center great I want that to be easy for people I want it to be easy and accessible for people to get their library materials um I just want to congratulate you for your restraint in not saying almost a million already because it's it must have been so tempting well we are going to get there absolutely nice round number sitting right out there for the for the taking um so I just want to make sure that we have not forgotten anything that's important to talk about because the last thing I want to do is just again go over for people what the upcoming dates and and events of importance are but have we have we missed anything big that we really should be talking about here I mean I think the next big thing that's going to come up so we are inviting community members as we said to fill out our survey we're inviting community members to attend our open public forums we are looking forward to presenting a warrant article to town meeting in April of 2024 April May spring town meeting our grant does require that town meeting approves a appropriation of $150,000 for planning and design and we are going to be offering over the next few months we're going to be offering a number of different opportunities for town meeting members as well as the community at large to learn more about the fox and why supporting this warrant article is really supporting a better community for everyone in Arlington and as part of that process we do and we are going to be offering tours tours of the building we want people to come in and see the building see what it means when we talk about the accessibility issues look and think about like you know do you have to take that front step how can you get and access the downstairs part of the building because if you can't you're not going to be able to access the services here and like we said we want this to be a library for all yeah I mean it's a little bit of a tough message here in a sense that you're giving because you're saying at the same time you're saying this place has been important for a long long time is a treasure in the area all of which I agree with by the way but you're also saying and it really needs to be better that's right yeah and again better really means first and foremost more accessible but better also means again better able to respond to the demand for services and to changes in those services etc that you have already seen over the years and can anticipate there's plenty of changes to come right yeah yeah so okay any final words then on on the project that you know is I can tell of palpable excitement for you guys and for me now and soon for the audience I'm sure no just thank you for the opportunity to kind of come and have this conversation with you and kind of give you a sense of as to what you know all the hard work that Anne has been doing to get this all up and running because it's really a great opportunity to speak to the community about this issue and allow them to understand and come see why this building is such a gem and why we want us to there and make it even better I just want to really kind of thank Adam and so many people who put work into thinking about this library back in the 2017 and 2018 period the foundation that we have we have really been able to take and move forward into really looking at post-pandemic needs it is a real honor to help the group of dedicated library users who started this conversation all those years ago come back circle back to this conversation this is still important for us and what are we going to be doing next to make sure that we are able to continue this journey to bring the library to the community that this community truly deserves and you know again just to reiterate surveys visits forums tours etc you are inviting the public in as many ways as you can to weigh in on this and I'm sure that there will be a response yeah your library is your public library we are not doing we we want to design the library that meets needs in our community and we can only do that one we hear from from our community members all right well we are going to definitely look forward to monitoring and charting the progress of this whole string of events that in the end is going to make art our community of Arlington even richer can you imagine that I want to thank you both for your time and again for opening up this lovely little space in the fox for us this morning I have been speaking for this library show episode about the fox with Anna Lytton the director of our library system and with Adam Del Molino who is congratulations on your 15 years I think I just did the map on the board of trustees for the library thank you so much thank you and thank you both for your time we really do appreciate their time and we appreciate yours as well I'm James Milan we'll see you next time we hope that you attend our open community forums on january 11th january 13th or on zoom on january 17th subscribe to our newsletter at robbinslibrary.org