Library considers community-wide user survey

Pound Ridge Library. Thane Grauel Photo

By NEAL RENTZ

For the first time in years, the Pound Ridge Library is planning to solicit town residents’ views through a survey.

Library Director Jennifer Coulter proposed the creation of a community survey, which was last done five years ago, at the Feb. 18 library board of trustees meeting.

Coulter said the state requires that each library have a long-range, community-based service plan. Libraries must conduct periodic evaluations of the effectiveness of their services, she said. Libraries’ budgets and services must address community needs in the long-range plan with documented input from the public and a survey could fulfill the state requirement for input, she said. 

“It’s a future strategizing tool,” Coulter said. 

She is proposing that a survey includes 15 questions, takes five minutes to complete and would be anonymous. Some of the questions could ask for personal information such as age, household size and how many years the survey-taker has lived in Pound Ridge, she said. The questions could seek such additional information as the respondents’ opinions on the library’s staff, collection, and hours, she said. In addition, questions could also address how patrons want to be informed of the library’s programs, how often they visit the library, which services they use, what new programs they want, what the library’s schedule should be and what new services it should provide, she said. 

The survey could also seek what respondents value most at the library and what they would change, Coulter said. 

Coulter said paper copies could be offered at the library and online surveys could be made available on the library’s website and through social media. The survey could be shared with schools, the town house, local businesses, and community organizations, she said. 

The survey could be promoted via posters and bookmarks, as well as staff reminders at check out and at library events, Coulter said.

Coulter is seeking to have responses to the survey returned over a four-week period beginning July 1, with survey results compiled and presented to the board of trustees. 

Coulter has set a target of 200 survey responses or more. The survey results would provide data the board of trustees could work with for the 2026-27 action plan; create clear priorities for the budget allocations and grant proposals and provide documented evidence of community engagement for the library’s stakeholders, she said. 

Some of the next steps for the potential survey, which will be a joint effort of the library board’s Public Relations and Long-Range Planning Committees, is to finalize the survey contents and determine how it will be distributed.

Library director lobbying 

Coulter told the trustees at last week’s meeting she participated in the Feb. 3 Library Advocacy Day in Albany. 

In a Feb. 3 Facebook post, Coulter wrote participants in the Advocacy Day were library employees, trustees and other library supporters. 

“What an inspiring day advocating for strong library funding, sharing our stories and meeting with New York State legislators to make sure libraries remain free, open and essential to every community,” she said. “When libraries show up together, our voices are loud — and impossible to ignore.”

The New York Library Association has a series of requests for  2026, including legislation on such issues as intellectual freedom, book licensing reform, media literacy and civil service reform, Coulter said. 

Coulter said library advocates from the local area met with state Sen. Pete Harkham and Assemblymember Chris Burdick.