Strategies That Public Libraries Use to Build Communities

This article is a companion to “The Role of Public Libraries in Community Building,” which appeared in Public Library Quarterly 30, no. 3. That article explored five facets of public libraries as agencies of community building: (1) how libraries serve as a conduit to access information and to learn, (2) how libraries encourage social inclusion and equity, (3) how libraries foster civic engagement, (4) how libraries create a bridge to resources and community involvement, and (5) how libraries promote economic vitality within the community. The goal of this article is to provide concrete examples of library community building. The focus here, therefore, is on the specific strategies that libraries employed to create and operate library programs that effectively built a library community.