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We hope everyone is enjoying the last days of summer. While the summer winds to a close we’re just warming up! After the big #SaveNilesLibrary rally on July 20th, we’ve been busy catching up with all the new connections we’ve made. This will be the engine that drives all of our campaigns. #SaveNilesLibrary is just the first of many to come!

#SaveNilesLibrary Campaign Update

The rally and budget action is part of a longer strategy. We’re going to keep showing up and speaking up when we see the board not representing the best interests of our community. None of this happens without the support from the community. For example, here we are delivering the We Support Niles-Maine District Library Employees petition 1500 of you signed onto!

Organizer flinging open a petition of 1500 supporters

💥 BAM! Isn’t that a beautiful thing?!

🗓 What’s next? The next Niles-Maine District Library board meeting is coming up this week! Wednesday, August 18th at 6:30pm, Commons Room, 6960 W Oakton, Niles. Here is the posted agenda. FYI we’ve learned that public comments are now only being accepted in-person (not very accessible).

📰 There’s been a lot written about our library in recent weeks. Some articles to check out:

Palaces for the plunderers
The library may well be the linchpin of the neighborly community in our modern society because the state of our libraries can tell us a lot about ourselves.

–Michael Romain, Journal of Oak Park & River Forest

Niles-Maine Library board votes to restore staffing cuts and building hours after public protests, labor complaint

–Jennifer Johnson, Chicago Tribune

Dark Days: Niles-Maine Library’s New Media Policy Largely Redacted

–Tom Robb, Journal & Topics

•And a blog post from the former Executive Director: Of Legal Fees and FOIA requests

It is completely ridiculous that now, in 2021, instead of being transparent, the Library is instructing their attorneys to make sure they reveal as little information as possible to people who ask. It’s particularly ridiculous because in my years as Director, the two people who filed the most FOIA requests were President Carolyn Drblik, and Treasurer Joe Makula. Now that the shoe is on the other foot and they are the ones being asked for their emails, etc., they are not so enthusiastic about responding to FOIA requests. And it is costing the taxpayers thousands and thousands of dollars.

–Susan Dove Lempke, Something Different Every Day

✅ Tip: if you’d like to use the library’s resources for reading the local newspapers, here are digital copies of the print versions: https://www.nileslibrary.org/research Look in the middle of the page, scroll down a little and click on the second option “America’s Newspapers Chicagoland Edition” and that’s where you can find local newspapers and select the newspaper you want and the print date that you want to read.

❤️‍🔥 THANK YOU to everyone who has reached out to us with ideas, to everyone who keeps coming out to board meetings, to those of you who share articles and blog posts on social media. We will win back our library and we win a more just community in the process!