A one-room library in a Rolling Meadows apartment complex reopened Wednesday, the result of a six-month community campaign to revive the place where children come to do homework and new immigrants go for information.
Since May, when Rolling Meadows Library officials closed the branch in a mostly Hispanic neighborhood, Rolling Meadows police have lobbied businesses and charities for donations.
One business sent a desk. A high school Spanish club held a book drive.
“I would see the kids knocking on the door, saying, `When are they open?’ It was heartbreaking,” recalled Victoria Bran, director of the Police Neighborhood Resource Center that houses the biblioteca (Spanish for library).
“We had to reopen,” Bran said.
One company brought three computers. A graphic designer made a new sign. The part-time receptionist of the resource center agreed that he would be the librarian too. Then on Wednesday, the local United Way donated $10,000.
When patrons walked into the room Wednesday, some wondered if the little library actually offered more books and movies than it had before it closed.
“I’m very pleased,” said Juana Cazares, 26, whose 6-year-old is starting to read. “It is good for the children. They learn so much here.”
The Rolling Meadows Library had run the library in the East Park Apartments for a decade as part of the Police Neighborhood Resource Center. Housed in a converted apartment building at 2272 Algonquin Pkwy., the center offers social services, medical treatment and classes to 3,500 residents, many of whom are recent immigrants.
The library always had steady use, last year circulating 21,000 books, videotapes and music recordings from its bilingual holdings, nearly 10 times the number of bilingual materials circulated by the library’s main branch.
But after an incident where two girls allegedly threatened a worker, library officials reviewed circulation numbers and decided to close the branch. They said they wanted to consolidate the bilingual collection and attract people to the main library.
About 50 local residents marched in protest, saying that many did not have cars or bus fare to get to the main branch. But library officials refused to reopen and moved the branch’s holdings to the library’s main branch at 3110 Martin Lane in May.
The Police Department went to bat for a new library, arguing that it would increase public safety by giving children something constructive to do.
The $16,000 annual funding for the new library comes through grants and city funding, Bran said.
On Wednesday, a volunteer gave library card applications to children stepping off school buses. Inside, six boys munched on cookies, browsed the holdings and later jockeyed for position in line to check out an armload of books and movies.
One of the boys, Armando Abrego, 12, said that after the library closed, he walked the 1 1/2 miles to the main branch. But he could not make the walk often, so he had to pay fines for late books.
“We didn’t have anything to read,” said his friend, Juan Ibarra, 11.
Though many felt the library needed to reopen, no one was sure how to find the money and the books, Bran said. “I was ready to beg,” she recalled.
The support–from local businesses, politicians and parents who lived in the apartment complex–was overwhelming. For many, the energy behind the campaign to save the library underscored just how important the little room of books is to the community.
“Some things,” Bran said, “are just meant to be.”
