Wayne residents soon get to ‘check out’ mobile library

“A bookmobile on steroids.” That’s how Maegen Wilson, assistant director of the Wayne County Public Library, describes the library’s new mobile unit. “It’s a bookmobile, but so much more than a traditional bookmobile.

“This vehicle has an awning and a mobile hot spot on it,” she continues. “So it will allow us to do everything from small-scale computer programs to story times for children…we’ll be able to pull right up to a neighborhood or to an area, and then the awning will come out, we can set out a carpet and do a full story time…scaled to meet the needs of that community.” It’s also equipped with a laptop, receipt printer, barcode scanner and wheelchair ramp, and it can operate on generator power if need be.

The mobile library cost $180,000 and was purchased with grant funds, as well as monies from the Wayne County Public Library Foundation and the County of Wayne. It is a Sprinter van — known for fuel efficiency — and it arrived in Goldsboro in January; it will be introduced to the public at three upcoming events: the grand opening of the new Northern Wayne Library in Fremont on April 10, the Mount Olive Pickle Festival on April 27, and Touch-a-Truck at the Wayne County Fairgrounds on May 11. Plans call for a soft launch of the mobile unit in July.

“We want to give children an opportunity to get out of school and maybe have a few weeks to start vacations and just have some downtime,” says Donna Phillips, director of the Wayne County Public Library. “But we are really targeting the summer, young children; we want to make sure that children in our community don’t experience what we call ‘the summer slide.’ We want to make sure we’re keeping them reading and learning all throughout the summer.”

In addition to children, the library will also focus on reaching seniors this summer. Both groups have shown a pronounced need for services since the pandemic. “When Covid hit, we really saw there was learning loss and a lot more isolation in senior adults,” Wilson explains.

There are still details to be worked out before the mobile library goes into service in July. “We are driving the roads now and talking with community partners to locate spots that would be safe for the mobile library to be and that would be conducive to serving large groups of children and senior adults,” Phillips notes. “We know we will be going to Grantham, to Dudley, to Seven Springs, to the Elroy area, Eureka and then back up William Street [in Goldsboro].” On William Street, Greenleaf Grace Village is a planned stop, as it has an apartment complex that serves senior adults and also a childcare center. Nearby Alpha Arms Apartments is another planned stop.

Strong community partnerships will be key to the mobile library’s success. In Grantham, for example, the library has requested permission to park at the Woodmen of the World building because of its central location in town. In Dudley, there are plans to collaborate with the WAGES (Wayne Action Group for Economic Solvency) Early Head Start program at the Stephen and Susan Parr Family Learning Center. Near Seven Springs, the library will amp up its already established partnership with Cliffs of the Neuse State Park, where the focus is on environmental education.

Also, notes Phillips, “We’re talking with volunteer fire departments so that if we have an emergency weather event, for example, we need to have safe shelter for our library staff. So the volunteer fire departments have been very gracious to say, yes, of course, you can come here.”

This summer will be a learning experience for Phillips and Wilson, providing them with a chance to evaluate the various routes and stops and to determine if any changes need to be made for the fall.

“One of the things we’re most appreciative of is our Library Foundation,” says Phillips. “They’ve really been thrilled that our library’s going to be able to offer this service and they wanted to do something to contribute to this in a big way in addition to helping with the purchase of the vehicle, so they agreed to purchase this collection of books for the mobile library.”

The mobile library will be stocked with approximately 1200 books: children’s, adults’, and large print. To check out books, a Wayne County library card will be required, and any patron who doesn’t already have one can get one from the mobile unit. It’s free for anyone who lives or owns property in the county or attends school here; to get a card, it will be necessary to show a picture ID and proof of address in Wayne County. Anyone outside the county must pay $15 for an out-of-county card.

According to Wilson, enthusiasm for the mobile library is already running high. “We’ve really gotten a lot of interest already,” she reports. “The communities seem very, very excited about it. We started fielding phone calls right away about it, so we think it’s going to be a well-loved and well-used resource.”

It’s been about 35 years since Wayne County was last served by a bookmobile. “We’ve enjoyed hearing, especially older community members, say ‘Oh, I remember when the bookmobile came to my community,’ and these are people that were in the more rural areas of our county, so Grantham, Nahunta, maybe even Rosewood area,” notes Phillips. “So it’s been a lot of fun for us to hear their stories.”

Just imagine the stories that will unfold in Wayne County’s new “bookmobile on steroids.