About Us

I’ve now been the Executive Director of the Garfield County Public Library District for a little over a year. During that time, I’ve had the chance to talk with almost all the staff, and many of the leaders in the community.

My philosophy of leadership is that it begins with listening. Then it’s a process of distillation. Eventually, it becomes pretty clear what an organization should focus on. So, here’s what the library will be working on in 2023.

Community interviews. What are the deep issues of our communities? To find out, we’ll be contacting many of you–business leaders, non-profit directors, educators, faith leaders, elected officials, and more–to hear from you exactly what we struggle with and aspire to. The library isn’t able to address everything, but the odds are good we can help. Of course, we’ll still stay focused on our own mission: promoting literacy, building community, growing knowledge. But that leaves us lots of scope to add our assets to those of others.

Adopt a long-range plan. At the conclusion of these interviews, we’ll look for a way to put the community at the center of our plans. As part of that process, we’ll be establishing an annual board retreat to adopt formal goals and measurements to ensure that we’re making progress.

Increase circulation (checkouts) by 20%. I’ve been comparing our statistics to those of other Colorado libraries. My goals are to put as many books in as many homes as possible. Countless studies have shown the power of early literacy: children are healthier and live longer, are less likely to wind up in jail, get more education and do better financially. What’s the tipping point? 500 books in the home. So, we’ll be focusing on more displays, booklists, reading clubs, and programs.

Building refreshes. Most of our buildings are now 10 years old, and it’s time to invest a little love in modernizing our spaces, both inside and outside. Stay tuned!

6A promises. In 2019, the voters approved library funding with the understanding that we’d step up our outreach to the many Spanish speakers in our community, to the seniors, to the veterans, and to teens. We also vowed to invest in our staff, to recruit, invest in, and retain people. That remains an ongoing focus.

Questions about our plans? Feel free to chat with your local branches. Or email me directly at jlarue@gcpld.org.