Annual report 2008

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Message from the Chair Today, Libraries are about more than just books. They are safe places for people to

come together to read, relax or enrich themselves. Last year alone, Vaughan Public Libraries (VPL) welcomed an impressive 13,148 new members.

Through this report, you will discover the Libraries’ progress in achieving the vision set out in our Today for Tomorrow, Strategic Plan: 2008-2011. The City of Vaughan is one of the fastest growing, culturally diverse cities in Canada and the Libraries’ collections and services respond to the needs of our evolving community. We invited your feedback; we listened to what you had to say and are putting your suggestions into practice.

Gino Rosati Chairman, Vaughan Public Library Board

Mission

Vaughan Public Libraries contribute to the success of our growing diverse community; serving its information, learning, leisure and cultural needs in a welcoming and safe environment.

In 2008, the Vaughan Public Library Board appointed Margie Singleton as Chief Executive Officer of Vaughan Public Libraries. Margie led VPL through the Libraries’ many accomplishments and highlights you will read about in the following pages.

On behalf of the Vaughan Public Library Board and all VPL library customers, I would like to sincerely thank the staff for their service to the community. Their enthusiasm, dedication and commitment is inspiring. I would also like to thank the citizens of Vaughan who have helped to shape the future of their Libraries. Thank you for your ongoing support, comments and feedback. Please, stop by, stay awhile and let us know how we can serve you better.

Gino Rosati Chairman, Vaughan Public Library Board

VPL’s Board Members Front Row (from L): Marie Chiaromonte, Michael McKenzie (Vice Chair), Gino Rosati (Chairman), Filippo Gravina Back Row (from L): Rajbir Singh, Suri Rosen, Tony Genco, Mario F. Ferri, Margie Singleton (CEO), Devender Sandhu, Lorraine de Boer, Jeffrey Stone, Rocco Capone Absent: Isabella Ferrara, Pradeep Puri, Alan Shefman

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Message from the CEO Executive Management Left to Right - Aleksandra Dowiat Vine, Director of Planning & Communication; Terri Watman, Director of Service Delivery; Margie Singleton, Chief Executive Officer; Marilyn Guy, Director of Operations; Sandy Vander Werff, Director of Finance.

Margie Singleton Chief Executive Officer

This is an exciting time for Vaughan Public Libraries. Guided by our new four-year

strategic plan, we are focused on our priorities to champion literacy, collaborate with the community, connect the community, empower the staff and communicate with stakeholders.

We pledge to our customers to continue to meet the needs of our rapidly growing and everchanging community. We will build bridges and forge partnerships in the community and continue to deliver value to the citizens of Vaughan.

In this report, you will discover the programs, events and opportunities that the Libraries in Vaughan have to offer. You will read about visiting authors and illustrators, special events such as Family Literacy Day Pyjama Party and celebrations of Black History and Asian Heritage Months. Last year 68,427 citizens participated in more than 3,000 programs.

From “Born to Read” for babies to “Senior Social”, something is always happening at VPL! To serve our customers better, we purchased more copies of bestsellers and began listing our new DVD and CD arrivals on our newly designed Library website. For customers’ convenience, we implemented wireless Internet access in all Libraries and equipped additional computers with Word, Excel and PowerPoint.

Corporate Values Intellectual Freedom VPL supports all expressions of knowledge and intellectual creativity providing global access to a full variety of information sources and ideas.

Literacy VPL promotes and fosters an informed and literate community.

Accountability VPL optimizes quality through effectiveness, values fiscal integrity and is accountable to our community.

Expertise VPL respects staff expertise and invests in ongoing professional growth and skills development.

Innovation It is the dedicated staff of Vaughan Public Libraries that accomplished these great things and I thank them for their wonderful support. I also extend my thanks to the committed and hardworking Vaughan Public Library Board. The results of their efforts are reflected in the successes you will read about in this report. Together, we are your library.

VPL fosters and rewards innovation, creativity and visionary leadership.

Collaboration VPL strengthens advice to our community through collaboration and cooperation.

Service Excellence Margie Singleton Chief Executive Officer

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VPL achieves excellence in all library services recognizing and responding to the diverse needs of our community.

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Join Us! Last year, nearly two million people visited the Libraries in Vaughan. If you live, work or are a full-time student in the City of Vaughan, you too can get a library card for free and take part in our wonderful programs and events.

VPL honours Black History Month with visiting authors, performances and art shows.

The Libraries celebrate Asian Heritage Month with cultural events, art exhibits, readings and programs like Yoga, Tai Chi and the Art of Origami. The month is packed full of wonder and excitement while recognizing the achievements of the Asian community.

Special guests that have joined our celebrations include Senator Vivienne Poy, Giller Prize winning author, Vincent Lam and television host and journalist Mary Ito. VPL marks The Day of Slavic Written Language and Culture in collaboration with the Russian Library and Community Information Centre.

The Libraries are your March Break Headquarters with fun, free and fabulous programs for everyone. We celebrate Family Literacy Day with a huge pyjama party, hosted by our librarians at the City Playhouse. It includes painting and stories with award-winning authors and illustrators, such as Werner Zimmermann and Kim Fernandes who bring everyone’s favourite stories to life. We even have a fun and funky library card designed just for kids!

The annual Early Harvest Competition is always a big hit.

Each year, hundreds of teens submit their best creative writing and favourite artwork for the chance to win prizes, be published in the Early Harvest magazine and celebrate at an awesome awards ceremony.

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Quick F acts fro m 2008 a t VPL ■ VPL offered o v

Looking to cool off in the summer? Join VPL’s TD Summer Reading Club. It’s a great way to meet new friends and enjoy the dog days of summer – all for free!

College and university students can study for their exams during special extended hours at Bathurst Clark Resource Library.

If you are a teen and looking to earn your community service hours for school, volunteer to join TRAC (Teen Reader’s Advisory Circle) or become a Reading Buddy.

Each year, VPL remembers the Holocaust during a weeklong event dedicated to honouring the legacies of the survivors and creating awareness about this devastating event.

Library materials are available in English, Italian, French, Hebrew, Russian, Spanish, Chinese, Gujarati, Hindi, Punjabi and Urdu. We also have new resources in Tamil, Farsi and Korean and VPL’s Welcome Brochure is now available in seven different languages.

If you are looking to host a community meeting, you can rent a fully equipped boardroom, training suite or other meeting rooms.

The librarians at VPL have access to amazing special collections and electronic databases. They can help you download books from the Internet and can set you up on computers fully equipped with Microsoft Office programs.

er 500,0 includin 00 it g: DVDs, 1 436,514 books ems , 5 and ma , 591 CDs, 545 32,449 gazine s newspap ub databas es, bests scriptions, 60 e ers ellers, n lectronic eBooks, ew A collectio udio Books, vid releases, eos, spec ns and m ial ore ■ 2,32 8,988 it ems wer e borrow ■ VPL ed was ope n 14,19 0 hours ■ 534 ,464 peo p le acc designed website essed our newly at www ■ 471 .vaugha ,426 qu npl.info e s t io ns were library s answere taff d by ■ 68,4 27 peop le attend program ed 3,103 s public ■ 200 compute rs, man Microso y equip ft were ava Word, Excel an ped with d ilable fo r custom PowerPoint ■ 104 e rs to use ,849 p Internet eople used the free pub stations lic ■ Chil dren pla yed ea compute r games rly literacy 17,849 ■ All times 7 VPL lo cations offered f re Internet e wireless access

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Champion Literacy Children of all ages love

Champion literacy for all members of the community by providing literacy programming and education for all ages, backgrounds and skill levels to build a healthy and prosperous Vaughan.

coming to the library and last year, over 37,000 children enjoyed attending 1,317 early literacy programs including favourites such as Born to Read. New events and programs like Snuggle Up & Read, Woodbridge Library’s Reading Tails where the children read to Winston, a St. John’s Ambulance therapy dog and Building Blocks, a program for parents of at-risk children entering kindergarten were introduced. Over 200 people attended our annual, fun-filled Family Literacy Day Pyjama Party with fabulous storyteller Aubrey Davis.

VPL invited children to meet well-known authors Angela Royes, Natale Ghent, Ruth Miller, Stephanie McPhee and Richard Scarsbrook.

Hundreds of children benefitted from Reading Buddies, a one on one reading program with over 200 volunteer buddies.

Librarians took the show on the road and visited local schools to promote early literacy programs offered at the libraries.

VPL launched a teen membership campaign tied to the release of the movie Twilight. Over 620 teens entered to win tickets to the movie’s opening night and other great Twilight prize packs.

The ever-popular Early Harvest competition for teens, of writing, photography, painting and sketching, drew over 300 entries.

Students can now chat online from home or school and ask a librarian questions through AskON. Over 150 new titles were added to the English as a Second Language (ESL) Collection and a new ESL Book Club was created. Visitors from various ESL groups were shown how to use the library and joined in activities and programs like Storytime for Adult Learners.

To help build computer skills of people living in the community, programs like Meet the Mouse and One on One Computers were developed. Over 400 people attended the customized computer training and over 90,000 people used VPL’s 200 computer stations last year.

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Collaborate WITH the Community

In response to your requests, we introduced 70,000 new items to VPL’s collections and

Collaborate with the community, to ensure responsive and accessible library collections, services and programming tailored to the needs of an ever-changing and growing community.

added more copies of bestsellers to make materials available to customers more quickly.

Popular collections such as the Italian language collection were updated and we introduced Italian Storytime at the Pierre Berton Resource Library. Last year, 135 children and their parents enjoyed hearing their treasured tales in Italian.

VPL added three new languages to our multilingual collections. Now you can check out books in Farsi, Korean and Tamil – in addition to the existing collections in Chinese, Gujarati, Hebrew, Hindi, Italian, Punjabi, Russian, Spanish, French and Urdu.

Library staff continued to reach out to local groups and organizations such as the Seniors Association of Vaughan Initiative, Human Endeavour, Elder Connections and Blue Willow Seniors Club to promote VPL and computer literacy programs.

As always, VPL invited volunteers to get involved. Teen volunteers earned community service hours by volunteering at the Teen Reader’s Advisory Circle (TRAC), Reading Buddies and Homework Club. TRAC groups and Reading Buddies were held at six of the seven library locations.

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Connect the Community VPL partnered with the City of Vaughan in the creation of the Active Together Masterplan for Parks, Recreation, Culture & Libraries, a plan for growth of library facilities.

Connect the community by providing enjoyable, welcoming destinations for people of all ages to spend time, gather with friends, learn something new, read, meet neighbours, study, attend a program, conduct a business meeting, hear a story, see culture in action, meet an author, search the Internet, live life.

To meet the needs of the community, the Libraries joined the City of Vaughan to embark on the development of an Accessibility Plan to ensure that library facilities are accessible to all.

Ansley Grove Library underwent extensive renovations and added new carpet and tiles.

Wood panels were also restored and display areas were installed to promote library collections.

Kleinburg Library received a facelift. It was painted, new shelving was installed and the computer terminals were rearranged to make it easier to access the workstations. The adult non-fiction collection was organized by categories such as cooking, computers and gardening to make browsing easier.

The TRAC (Teen Readers’ Advisory Circle) group worked closely with library staff at Woodbridge Library to transform an unused area into a very cool, hip teen nook.

An After Hours Study Hall pilot project was launched at Bathurst Clark Resource Library. Monitored by a security guard, the meeting room and foyer were transformed into study areas and nearly 600 students made use of the space in just one month.

Libraries on the Go was introduced and library staff brought cases of materials to senior groups and newcomers at the Vellore Village Community Centre. Staff also visited 48 local, long-term health care centres. Over 1,000 items were borrowed through this program.

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Commit TO Empower Staff

Staff received customer service training and created VPL’s new Customer Service Pledge and Principles.

Library staff took part in many training sessions, workshops and in-house staff forums.

Town Hall meetings were held with VPL’s CEO to envision the future direction of the Libraries.

Librarians attended Open Houses and Job Fairs at the Faculty of Information (University of Toronto) to educate recent graduates about career opportunities with VPL. Bathurst Clark Resource Library hosted work placements for University of Toronto and Seneca College students to help them gain practical job experience.

Librarians attended the annual Ontario Library Association Super Conference.

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Here’s what some customers had to say:

“The people working here are amazing, helpful and friendly. Thank you and keep up the good work!”

“My daughter and I have been attending the Friday morning class.

The librarian who leads the group has to be one of the most fun, energetic, outgoing leaders of any childrens’ program that I have attended. He is by far our favourite and he does an outstanding job. The adults seem to enjoy the program just as much as the children. Keep up the great work! We think you are terrific!”

Commit to empower staff to continue to provide excellent public service in a dynamic culture that reflects the quality of service the community expects from their Libraries.

“I was very impressed with the library… I was mostly impressed with how I was treated and the selection and quantity was good. Everyone was very helpful.”

“As the Small Business Consultant for Vaughan Business Enterprise Centre, I am writing to thank you for all the support we receive throughout the year.

Your staff is invaluable to us.”

We Value our customers

Provide collections, services and a community hub

Lead through our commitment to customer service

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Communicate WITH Stakeholders VPL continued its ongoing consultation with

Communicate with stakeholders to create, cultivate and expand awareness, usage and relevance of Vaughan Public Libraries’ collections, services and programs designed to fulfil their information, learning, leisure and cultural needs. rary UR Lib YO know wants to think what

YOU

the community through surveys published in the At The Library magazine, distributed throughout the Libraries and available online. Nearly 1,000 people responded and the overall majority said they were satisfied with the programs, resources and level of service offered at VPL. In an ongoing effort to reach out and communicate with the citizens of Vaughan, VPL played a part in community events such as the South Asian Trade Fair, Vaughan Business Expo, Binder Twine Festival, Thornhill Village Festival, Maple Pancake Fest and Woodbridge Fair.

VPL participated with the City of Vaughan to offer storytimes during Winterfest and hosted a variety of programs and activities, at all seven locations, in support of WinterLights, Communities in Bloom and other great events.

Through a focus on marketing and communications, complemented by the support of local media, a greater awareness of VPL’s resources, services, programs and special events was created. In addition, our Welcome Brochures, translated into French, Italian, Russian, Hebrew, Hindi and Chinese offered more Vaughan citizens an opportunity to learn about all that the Libraries have to offer them.

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Our newly designed website was launched, improving customer convenience and communication. One of the new components is a catalogue site just for kids available through KidZone at www.vaughanpl.info. Another feature is the New Arrivals list, including CDs and DVDs, that offers VPL customers advance notice of materials arriving soon.

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Financial Information The Corporation of the City of Vaughan Public Library Board THE CORPORATION OF THE CITY OF VAUGHAN PUBLIC BOARD FinancialLIBRARY Activity for the Year Ended December 31, 2008 Financial Activity for the Year Ended December 31, 2008

REVENUES City of Vaughan $ 10,462,127 City ofcontribution Vaughan contribution $ 10,462,127 Fees, and sundry 264,057 Fees, rental and rental sundry 264,057 Provincial / other grants 145,244.00 Provincial/other grants 145,244 City of Vaughan Contribution (97%) Fees/Rental & Sundry (2%) Provincial/Other Grants (1%)

Total

Total

$

$ 10,871,428 10,871,428

Staffing Staffing $ Resources Resources Facilities Facilities Communications Communications Administrative Administrative Total

Total $

7,795,293 $ 7,795,293 1,589,361 1,589,361 1,005,730 1,005,730 385,091 385,091 189,975 189,975

OPERATING EXPENDITURES

Staffing (70%) Facilities (9%) Administrative (2%)

Resources (15%) Communications (4%)

$

10,965,450

10,965,450

CAPITAL EXPENDITURES Ansley Grove Renovation $ Ansley Grove Renovation Technology/Equipment Technology/Equipment

Total

Ansley Grove Renovation (61%) Technology/Equipment (39%)

Total

$

145,830 $ 145,830 95,148 95,148 240,978 $

240,978

TOTAL NET LIBRARY EXPENDITURE - BY BRANCH

($ Millions)

11.00 8.25 5.50 2.75 0.00 -

2004

2005

2006

2007

2008

Woodridge Pierre Berton Maple Kleinburg Dufferin Clark Bathurst Clark Ansley Grove Admin/Operations

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Ongoing Library Programs CHILDREN  Born to Read  Ready to Read  Toddling to Read  Family Storytime  Kids’ Book Chat  School & Daycare Visit  Summer Reading Club  March Break Headquarters  Family Literacy Day Pyjama Party  Reading Buddies  One On One Computer Training

TEENS  Teen Readers’ Advisory Circle (TRAC)  One On One Computer Training  Reading Buddies Volunteer  High School Visit  Annual Early Harvest Competition  Red Cross Babysitting Training

ADULTS  Cracking the Keyboard  Internet for Beginners  Email Made Easy  Meet the Mouse  Vaughan Poets’ Circle  ESL Book Club  Adult Book Chats  Senior Social

EVERYONE  Annual Book Sale  Asian Heritage Month  Black History Month  Communities in Bloom  Day of Slavic Written Language & Culture  Holocaust Education Week  Library Settlement Program for Newcomers  WinterLights Celebrations

LOCATIONS

Ansley Grove Library Bathurst Clark Resource Library Dufferin Clark Library Kleinburg Library Maple Library Pierre Berton Resource Library Woodbridge Library Contact Us

905-653-READ (7323) Administrative Office 900 Clark Avenue, West Vaughan, Ontario L4J 8C1

www.vaughanpl.info