2014 Report to the taxpayers and residents of Swan’s Island
After being in our building for almost three years, the SIES board and I are quite comfortable with presenting some statistics that might interest you.
The library is staffed 25 hours each week year-round. The building is open to be used by the community 7 days a week year-round by appointment. Historical society volunteers work weekly on special projects and meet monthly on the first Sunday of the month. Library volunteers have cataloged over 13,000 items since the fire. The SIES board meets monthly on the second Monday of the month with our annual meeting being held at our August meeting. All are welcome to attend any of our meetings and your participation is encouraged. Volunteers are also welcome as we have many jobs that are for just once in a while or on a scheduled basis, both for library and historical work.
Volunteers – 1,825 hours
Time that volunteers contributed saved SIES $31,000.00. Thank you! We couldn’t provide all that we do without our volunteers.
Visits to the library – 5,417
Including the people we missed counting and those who use our WiFi service, I would estimate the number of visits to the library to be closer to 5,600.
The following figures will show that for every $1.00 of the $12,000.00 donated to SIES by the town of Swan’s Island, the community receives $7.63 worth of services and savings. The $12,000.00 donated by the town is less than 1% (0.7%) of the town budget or for every $500.00 of property tax $3.50 goes to SIES.
Material and building use monetary values are based on Maine State Library value calculator. Visit the following web-link to try the calculator yourself. http://www.maine.gov/msl/services/calculator.htm. For library users who have tried the calculator and turned in their figures to me, the average savings per family is $450.00 per month.
Checkouts – 7000 items
This is a very close approximation in that we have some categories that cross over each other.
Adult fiction 984 Large print 20 Movies – preschool 30
Adult nonfiction 317 Maine – fiction 201 Movies – children 600
Adult audiobooks 55 Maine – nonfiction 138 Music 8
Interlibrary loan° 137 Maine – mystery 103 Oral history transcripts 8
Preschool 345 Middle Reader fiction 300 Swan’s Island Special Collections 10
Children 635 Middle Reader – audiobooks 5 Young adult – fiction 350
Beginning Reader 500 Movies – adult 1600 Young adult – nonfiction 217
eBooks 115 Movies – adult nonfiction 39
Total value of the above listed items -$ 71,980
° – use of interlibrary loan saved SIES $4,100 in book purchases minus the $350.00 postage to return the items.
Equipment – 375 uses = $4,500.00
This category includes computers, iPads, eReaders, and portable equipment used by the historical society. IPads are used in house only but eReaders are available for checkout.
Programs – 65 adult and children programs = $5,600.00
We had an approximate total program attendance of 700 people or an average of 11 people per program.
Meetings and Community use – 180 uses = $9,500.00
Some examples of uses are public and organizational meetings, birthday parties and receptions, yoga, food co-op, Noah’s Ballast practice, school and nursery school visits, League of Town meetings, and more.
Checkouts, equipment, programs, and meetings value = $91,580.00
$91,580 / $12,000 = $7.63
Respectfully submitted,
Candis Joyce, Executive Director
Swan’s Island Educational Society