Library Receives $75,000 Grant for Bookmobile

The librarian-and-driver for Georgetown’s colorful bookmobile will now have a helper, thanks to a state grant and the popularity of the little library on wheels.

The Georgetown Public Library received a special projects grant for $75,000 from the Texas State Library and Archives Commission to support the operation of the library’s bookmobile in the next fiscal year. This is the third and final year of funding from the State Library, which has funded the operation of the WOW!mobile since it started rolling through the community two years ago.

During the first two years the grant covered the salary of the community outreach librarian and equipment and books for the program. This year, because the bookmobile service has expanded so dramatically, instead of books the grant will fund a part-time assistant for the librarian.

Michele Harber, the community outreach librarian who drives the bookmobile, is pictured at a recent stop at the Mariposa apartment homes on River Bend Drive. (Click on photo for a larger version.)

The bookmobile now makes more than 70 stops per month at Georgetown’s retirement communities, assisted living and nursing facilities, Head Start, preschools, charter schools, apartment complexes, and even some neighborhoods. During the past year more than 23,000 items were checked out from the mobile library.