The first shelving units are arriving at the Linwood Community Library. Pocahontas Woods, under the guidance of master furniture craftsman John Wesley Williams, has designed and is constructing beautiful oak book shelves. The Snowshoe Foundation has provided major funding. These shelves will be relocated when the new library is built. Until then, they will hold books at the Welcome Center interim library.

The Linwood Community Library should open for services any day now. Librarian Cree Lahti, assistant Sarah Shearer, and VISTA volunteer Sarah Eilers have spent hours cleaning, painting, preparing equipment, and processing books in preparation for opening. McClintic Librarian Vicky Terry continues to provide training and oversight as the library gets ready to open. Terry holds a Masters Degree in Library Science, and is one of only a few in West Virginia credentialed to train cataloging.

The Linwood community (Slaty Fork, Snowshoe, Mace and even into Randolph County) has been superb in volunteering time, materials, and money for this project. A list of those who have contributed will be in a forthcoming column since to list these now would take up the rest of this column.  I will mention, however, that many contributions of high quality books are coming in as donations. 

Several high speed Internet computers are up now for public use.  The building has wireless capability.  Since the library will function also as a community center, programs are starting up such as yoga, movie nights and a pre-school children program.

On Wednesday, January 27, the Durbin Building Committee traveled to Charleston to meet with our legislators to seek funding help.  The caravan included PCFL board president and Durbin resident Sue Ann Heatherly, Durbin Librarian Tara Bauserman, library assistant Nancy Egan, Durbin Building Committee Chair Judy Fuller, Upper Pocahontas County Community Cooperative President Jason Bauserman and his son, Jeremy Bauserman, and me.  We were graciously received in individual meetings with Senator Walt Helmick, Senator Clark Barnes, Delegate Bill Hartman and Delegate Mike Ross. Our Durbin Building Committee members felt very hopeful following the meetings. Also during the trip, we toured the state library commission. On the return trip home, some of the group stopped at the Weston office of the United States Department of Agriculture to discuss possible grants and loans with Paula Moeller.

Then on Thursday, February 4, a number of us traveled again to Charleston for the West Virginia Library Association’s Legislative Day. We were thankful for clear weather sandwiched between winter storms. As Legislative Committee Chair, I was pleased with a large turnout from across the state to support libraries. The library association held an excellent reception attended by many legislators. Once again our own delegation showed hospitality, interest and support for libraries as we met with them. Attending from Pocahontas County were Vicky Terry, Jane Mospan, Arnold Stewart, Nancy Egan, Ginger Must, Elwood and Ann Groves and Allen and Debora Johnson.

I should mention that Hillsboro Library’s heating system crashed several weeks ago. First the heat pump, and later the heat strips.  Currently, we are operating on space heaters with limited circuits available, thus we have difficulty during extreme cold temperatures keeping our temperature at normal. We have tentative plans to do a major overhaul of the heating/cooling system this year. Until then we ask the public to bear with us.