ASHFIELD — A $20,000 grant from the American Library Association is assisting in Belding Memorial Library’s efforts to be more accessible for seniors and people with disabilities.

“Through this next year, the feedback of our community will guide how we spend this money, to ensure that the changes we make and the services we offer will continue into the future, long after this grant is over,” Library Director Sarah Hertel-Fernandez wrote in an email.

The grant was awarded as part of the national association’s Libraries Transforming Communities: Accessible Small and Rural Communities initiative. The Ashfield library was chosen alongside 240 other libraries across the U.S.

Hertel-Fernandez thinks it is important to focus on improving services for residents with disabilities because “anyone and everyone can experience disability, at any point in their lives. That can be short-term or long-term – the result of an injury, an illness, an age-related condition. Once we think of it that way, it’s in all of our interests to make the world easier to navigate.”

With this grant money, Belding Memorial Library’s staff will take an online course on how to effectively lead conversations. This is a skill, Hertel-Fernandez argues, that is vital to library work today.

Next, they will host a community conversation on Monday, July 17, at 11 a.m. at the Senior Center in Shelburne Falls, where they will ask seniors to help brainstorm how libraries can better serve them. This conversation will be held in partnership with the Buckland Public Library and the Arms Library.

Hertel-Fernandez decided to apply for the grant after making a five-year “long-range” plan for Belding Memorial Library. In the process of making the plan, the library staff conducted a survey asking Ashfield residents for feedback about the library. Hertel-Fernandez also connected with Julianne “Juli” Moreno, director of the Senior Center in Shelburne Falls that serves residents of Shelburne, Buckland and Ashfield, to receive further input.

“So much of the feedback we got was about expanding services to seniors, figuring out why seniors might not be using the library, and updating the building and grounds to be more comfortable and accessible,” Hertel-Fernandez wrote.

The suggestions the library staff received ranged from small to large changes, and alterations began quickly after the feedback came in. Some smaller, less expensive changes include installing better signs and lighting, and starting a home delivery service for library materials.

Larger suggestions that have not yet been implemented because of a need for funding include installing electric door openers and induction hearing loop equipment to assist patrons who are deaf or hard-of-hearing, and offering transportation to and from library events.

Belding Memorial Library will now spend the next year gathering feedback on how to spend the $20,000 grant in a way that makes the library most accessible to all patrons.

“When we make public libraries accessible to everyone,” Hertel-Fernandez wrote. “the entire community benefits.

Bella Levavi can be reached at 413-930-4579 or blevavi@recorder.com.

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