Commission Meeting Agenda Item

The Lady Lake Library Board was established on March 6, 1989 and has served the Town well for several decades. It has been difficult in the last few years to recruit volunteers to sit on the Board and recently one of our long-time volunteers resigned leaving only two members -neither of whom can regularly attend meetings, further, there is not a quorum. The board members have said publicly that with the library building project completed and The Friends of the Library playing an active role at the library, they are not serving a purpose.

While it is sad to dissolve any group that has been so valuable in the past, it is a sign of the times; it is difficult to recruit volunteers and libraries serve a different purpose now. Libraries are not focused solely on books and reading. In a sense, libraries have been rebranded. Activities, programs, and events are commonplace in libraries now and policies are often recommended by Lake County for the countywide system.

Library Advisory Boards are not required, in fact, there are only four municipalities in the county that have them: Eustis, Leesburg, Tavares and Mount Dora. The only drawback to not having a Board is if there is a book challenge, in which case, the Commission would be the final arbiter though Lake County Library Director, George Taylor, said they would certainly offer support. If there was such an occurrence, the Library Board would still just be able to make a recommendation and that is only if there was a quorum.