FRIENDS OF SOLDIERS MEMORIAL LIBRARY

Public library services for our community. The most important program service accomplishment for this year is our work to provide public library services for the Town of Hiram. This service is provided in the Soldiers Memorial Library building, a century-old historical building owned by the Town. Although the town owns the building, we own all of the furnishings and equipment. We provide the collections of books and other materials, six computers for public use, Internet services for the public, printing and copying services, and assistance with whatever needs have brought visitors to our facilities. We maintain hired staff to have the Library open to the public for 19-hours-per-week, with some of the open hours maintained by volunteers. The staff also hosts a children's story hour, and provides a venue for groups such as the "Knotty Knitters" (a knitting club), and for other programs and events. The Library has a collection of more than 6,000 items for loan, and has a web site where the collection can browsed using the Library World on-line catalog. On any of the four days each week when we have open hours, we may host a number of patrons varying from just a few to as many as dozens each day. Records of numbers of patron visits and types of uses are maintained and reported to the Maine State Library and to the Town. The library service does not bring in revenue except for some incidental donations.

Providing the Arts Center building for many public uses. Maintaining and providing for public use a building that we own and manage in Hiram village is another important public service for our community. This building, the Arts Center at 8 Hancock Avenue, is a former church that has been renovated and improved to make a comfortable and attractive function space. The building has two floor levels: the lower floor has space for groups of up to 30 to 40 persons, while the main floor has a space that is suitable for up to 75 to 80 persons. The public library next door is also available for use for some purposes, but the size of that building limits groups to about ten persons, and the uses must avoid disrupting the public library facilities. The Arts Center is more flexible and recent uses include: (1) as a site for many adult education programs such as yoga classes, crafts instructions, and many other courses, (2) use as space for birthday parties, weddings and other family events for an inexpensive rental donation, (3) a facility that can still be used for memorial services for which we make no charges if the need involves community members, (4) with the heat pumps that have been installed and the FHA furnace, we can host meetings at any time of year, and other community organizations (some have buildings without year-round heat or cooling) often use this building for their meetings, (5) this building is also used as the regular practice facility for a local community band, and we host at least two band concerts there each year, and many other types of programs including music concerts, dramatic presentations, visiting author events, etc. Regarding the listed expense, the maintenance of the building was accomplished with the $3805 expenditure that is listed, but during 2023, we also had a project to add a third exit doorway for better safety on the main floor. That construction work added $6807 to the costs of management of the building for this year, but with most of that added cost paid by a grant. That $6807 is not considered as an expense, but is an improvement, adding to the value of the building. The revenue of $741 is from cost-defraying rental donations.