Survey shows growth at Cheney Library

The Spokane County Library District gave the Cheney City Council a rundown of its five-year survey results, noting service increases across the board at the Cheney Library.

At the Tuesday, July 23 meeting, the library noted the various conversations it had with community members, which took place throughout the county at each branch last year. Input gathered from those community meetings was reviewed by trustees and staff to identify service priorities and develop measurable goals and objectives for the future.

Over the past five years, the library has seen a 3-percent increase in cardholders, growing to 8,792. While that number hasn’t increased much, total visitors were up by 22 percent. Of those, 19,935 were computer users, a demographic that increased by 5 percent.

Circulation has also increased over those five years, growing to 177,101 items checked out, an increase of 15 percent.

The library’s meeting room has also seen an increase in recent years, up by 11 percent. During the survey time period, 185 bookings were made for the meeting room.

Among the many areas on which the library focuses, included is having print and online resources available for all ages. That includes having programs like Science Saturdays for the younger kids as well as Beyond Books and Backyard Bounty for adults. Those programs are made possible through partnerships with Mobius and Humanities Washington.

Of importance to the county includes having resume writing software and classes available for members of the community looking to apply for new jobs. The emphasis is countywide, given the economic recession and unemployment rates regularly staying at 7 percent nationwide. In addition to the software, the library has numerous online career resources. Partnerships include Work Source, the Institute for Extended Learning as well as regional organizations like Greater Spokane Incorporated and the West Plains Chamber of Commerce.

The Cheney Library is open seven days a week and has approximately 41,000 items available for members to check out. Additionally, the library has programming for all ages and opportunities for online learning and accessing databases.

James Eik can be reached at [email protected].