Home Delivery of books on a three week rotation is provided to the manors. Nancy Neiman volunteers her time for this service.

Magazine delivery is made to 6 local businesses for their customers to browse through while waiting. 

A depository of paperback books is available in the lobby of Peoples Bank in Milo. This is a self serve check out system.

Classroom Book Rotation provides four rooms in the Milo Elementary School a box of 30 books each every 2 weeks for free time reading. We would like to get our email address to the teachers so they could let me know any subjects they may be studying and may need additional materials for. There is always a push statewide to work closer with our school districts in sharing materials and resources.

Our Open Access program, which allows patrons with a current library card from any participating library in Iowa use of our materials, is gaining in popularity. They can also return the material to whichever participating library is more convenient for them. That library in turn is responsible for returning the material by mail to the loaning library. This is a state funded program, which pays the libraries per circulated item, and reimburses the returning library for its postage expense. This is the only way we get funding for the people who live in other communities who use our library. The City provides funds for its residents, Warren County provides funding for our rural patrons, and Open Access funding covers everyone else who uses our library.

Access Plus is another state funded program that encourages and supports multi-type library resource sharing through interlibrary loans and sharing of periodical articles. We are funded a small part of the cost of sending our library materials to other libraries in the state. This is now done online. Last year we borrowed 46 items and loaned 56 items to other libraries.

Our Summer Reading Program continues to be successful with 30 – 50 children participating. They spend 2 hours at the library for 4 sessions with story time, crafts, snacks, and games and songs. Our director this year was Renee Minton.   The theme last year was "Paws, Claws, Scales and Tales."

Reference service is available through the Central Iowa Library Service Area and with the funding cuts at the State Library and Regional Library level, this service is greatly diminished. We no longer are contracted with the Ames Public Library for this service.

This reference program was able to provide most answers by fax or phone within 24 hours at full funding. Now the reference staff has been drastically cut and the service takes much longer. The Regional Library has been offering more training for libraries on reference researching on the Internet to provide more reference service at the local level.

A Fax Machine and Copier are available at the Library for public use.

Paula Is an Iowa Notary Public and provides notary services free of charge.

An Outside book return for patron convenience.

Free video Checkout is offered.

Convenient hours are offered to our patrons.

The library is open six days a week for a total of 23 hours per week, which include evenings, weekend, and morning hours.

FUNDING:        Return to top of page

We are very appreciative and pleased with the continued support of the City for library services. 

The Warren County funding is based on a formula that has been devised and refined over the years by the six librarians in the county. Part of the formula includes a base rate of $2,500 and the rest of the total dollars is split according to each library’s percentage of the total rural circulation of materials. 

Milo City Funding is done on a yearly budget basis. The Library Board presents a proposal to the city council for an amount based on last years expenses, current salary, and the requested funding from the county. The city council then sets an amount for library services and incorporates this into their annual budget. They also pay for the gas and electricity. Let your council members know how much you appreciate their continued support of the Milo Public Library.

Our State Funding has changed. What was Enrich Iowa funding has been split into a couple areas, one being infrastructure funding. This is for building improvements or furnishing. 

The other area is Direct State Aid designated for technology, equipment, or expanded services. We used this portion to add CD-ROM titles for patron use, tampering protection for our computers and memory upgrades.

Our one big fund-raiser for materials is our ADOPT-A-BOOK program usually held in March. People can pick a title or titles from our "wish list" and "adopt" it by paying the cost of this item. A gift plate is placed in each item adopted, giving the name of the donor.  We also have centennial books and plates for sale. 

Memorial gifts also help us purchase new books, videos, shelving, and equipment.

The library is home to 112,474 books, 78 magazine subscriptions, 173 books on tape, 438 videos, and 23 computer applications. This and all other items give us a total of 13,240 items.

STATISTICS        Return to top of page

Circulation of Materials

Adult: 3,628

Children’s 7,358

Videos 1,317

Periodicals 1,233

Audio Books 63

All Other Items 58

Total Circulation: 13,657

Rural Circulation: 2,951

Open Access: 32

Reference Questions: 315

Registered Patrons 1,023

Annual Attendance 6,516

Computer Usage 2,392

The library building was used for non-library activities 24 times last year.

Director Salary: $13.00 per hour

Assistant Salary $8.50 per hour

Paula Griggs has been employed here since 1979 and became director in 1987. She is in her 16^th year of State Certification. Renee Minton was hired in June of 2005 to work o21 hours a week during library hours.

The city of Milo and the surrounding area has a library to be proud of and we as staff and the library board wish to thank the patrons, the city, and the county for their continued support of the services provided by this library.