The 1st Annual General Meeting of Friends of the Library Mount Gambier took place on Thursday 14th July 2011
Sue Briffa took the chair for the election of officers.
The new committee is:
President - Helen Boomsma
Secretary - Lee Cranwell
Treasurer - Nelda Earl
Events Co-ordinator - Patricia Reed
Membership - Cynthia Richardson
Young Friends - Chris Lloyd
Committee - Julienne Feast, Louise Rockne, Heather Zeck.
President's Report
Friends of the Library Mount Gambier has got off to a good start with the formation of an enthusiastic committee which has been in operation for just over a year and can chalk up many achievements.
Any committee is only as good as its members and ours have been great!
President - Helen Boomsma; Vice-President - Betty Manifold; Secretary – Sue Briffa until she left us for a job on the Library staff then Glenys Mitchell; Treasurer - Nelda Earl; Events Co-ordinator - Patricia Reed; Membership Officer - Cynthia Richardson; Young Friends - Chris Lloyd; committee members - Nora Smibert, Kelvin Smibert, Cheryl Tilley, Marian Thomson, Jane Pellen-Philps, Jayne Stacey, Lee Cranwell; ex-officio – library manager Cathryn Harris.
Our patron is Don Pegler MP.
Thank you to all committee members for their hard work during the year.
Our Mission is to support Mount Gambier Library and its concept of
Learn – Connect – Explore.
Our Aims are:
• to promote the Library within the community and encourage use of its resources
• to undertake recreational activities and organise events
• to raise funds to enable the expansion of cultural and educational projects
• to seek additional support, sponsorship and funding.
The events undertaken in the last year have all worked within those guidelines.
We have promoted the Library in lots of ways, one of them being the establishment of Bound by Books every three months where members of Mount Gambier’s book groups come together to discuss their activities, listen to a panel discussion on a selected book and enjoy a delicious afternoon tea catered by the committee. This has been so popular that there are now four new book groups.
We have held Master Classes in cheese (3 life-sized painted cows took up residence in the Library during the lead-up to this event), cake-decorating, river cruising with Gambier Coachlines, Do-It-Yourself Workshop with Mitre10 and Bridge in the Library during Senior’s Week 2010 plus we organized 250 Bendigo Bank piggy banks to be given away during the Library’s first birthday celebrations.
The film Eat Pray Love starring Julia Roberts was a great night when we served pizza pre-movie, filled the Oatmill Cinema and raised over $1000.
Young Friends have held a successful Friday Fright Night with pizza and formed their own book group under the guidance of Chris Lloyd.
Very Young Friends had a Teddy Bears Picnic in the Park with fruit and water supplied by OPAL after a storytelling session with Library staff. Libeary, our soft cuddly teddy (a bargain at $5!) was launched at this event and has been a steady seller, raising over $1000. Committee members, local primary school children under the guidance of Patricia and Boandik Lodge ladies have all been involved in knitting red scarves for him.
We have run a cloakroom for the Blue Lake Boral Fun Run and escorted Father Christmas wearing the Library’s suit to a staff party at Woolworths.
The bookends of my presidency have been the Big Book Sales: July 2010 raised $2500 and July 2011 raised $2900. The Wheelbarrow Raffle organized by Cynthia Richardson raised $2600 – useful sums to add to the Library’s available funds.
We have supplied supper for Meet the Author Events – Peter Goldsworthy, Peter Fitzsimons, Peter Rymill (I thought 2010 was the Year of the Peters), Dee Nolan, Fiona Palmer, Anna Lanyon, Nicole Alexander, Fiona McIntosh and thoroughly enjoyed meeting these interesting people.
We have tried not to be a catering organisation but our afternoon teas are so good we keep being invited to cater which we did for a talk by Julian Burnside on human rights, an event which outgrew the Library and had to transfer to the Sir Robert Helpmann Theatre, taking us with it; and for Birds on the Brink, a photographic exhibition in the Library which also grew in numbers from the expected 60 to 170.
Cynthia and I attended the State Forum for Friends of the Library in Adelaide and were pleased to discover that our activities are well up there with other libraries, in fact they wanted to know more details. Similarly we came away with new ideas.
Funds raised have gone towards the purchase of more audio books for the library – this is a high priority - also e-books from Bolinda, a bicycle for the City Bikes programme and a Friends’ noticeboard which is in place by the front door.
What happens in the next year is up to the new committee: already there a few interesting events in the planning stages. I would like to see more involvement by those Friends who are still just names on a mailing list – how can we lure them to the Library events? I am sure there are people out there waiting to help in some way. There is great community acceptance and pride – even love – for the Library so we must tap in to that.
Helen Boomsma, President 2010-2011
