ST. CLOUD, Minn. — Times have changed, and so have libraries.
"Our libraries are a community hub, regardless of which community it's in," Great River Regional Library Executive Director Karen Pundsack said. "In some communities the main function it serves is broadband access to the communities."
And as a place that's all about books, the Great River Regional Library system decided let's focus even harder on making it easier for folks to get to those books.
"Back in 2018, we did a user study and it revealed that transpiration and fines are two of the major barriers that folks have when wanting to visit the library," Jami Trenam said. Trenam is the assistant director of collections development at GRRL.
A quick solution turned out to be going "fines-free." Since the start of the year, the library system got rid of its late fees. And as evidenced in their pilot program of waving fees for juvenile and kids materials, the benefits outweighed the fees.
"We did not see a marked change in the rate in how people were returning the materials," Trenam said. "We just heard a lot of positive feedback from our patrons, parents, grandparents and daycare providers. Juvenile circulation began to increase, and that is a trend that has continued to this day."
They saw it as an investment in a community that invests in them.
Pundsack said this has been especially meaningful for the communities they serve with their 33 libraries in Central Minnesota.
"Great River is a pretty diverse community in a lot of different ways, but we also have some great pockets of poverty regardless of color," she said. "So we have three of our six counties that have median income below the state average. When we think about the people we're targeting, yes it's the BIPOC community in the St. Cloud area, but it might be those kids who are living in rural poverty who might not have transportation to the library that also are impacted."
And most importantly, they want to re-embrace folks who may have shied away from coming back.
"The biggest thing that people have been excited about is having their slate clean," Breanne Fruth said. "So people who may have not returned due to the cost of fines...it gave all of our 33 library locations the opportunity to truly be free, open and welcoming to all."
The library still has fees for damaged or lost materials, and expects patrons to still return books by their due dates. However, instead of fines, they are working to 'lock' accounts so all overdue materials have to be returned before patrons can access computers at the libraries.
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