Daniel Boone Regional Library

The Daniel Boone Regional Library (DBRL) Board of Trustees adopted the 2009-2017 Strategic Plan Thursday, April 16. The plan includes new vision and mission statements, a core values statement and nine goals. Three key ideas are at the heart of the plan:

1. Expanding and enhancing library services for our patrons
2. Creating awareness of the library's value to the community and
3. Enhancing the library's organizational effectiveness.

Now staff will begin writing an action plan that contains the necessary details to implement the priorities for the coming year. From the action plan, the operating budget for CY2010 will be prepared and presented in November. Throughout the following year, the board's long-range planning committee will review the progress of the action plan, the finance committee will monitor the budget, and the communications committee will ensure that DBRL is keeping our constituents informed. Then the strategic process will begin again, with an annual action plan written for 2011, and so on.

The board and staff began working on the new strategic plan this past fall. The planning team, made up of seven board members, the DBRL director and associate director, and three community members (Craig Brumfield, business development officer for Callaway Bank; Lee Fritz, Callaway County presiding commissioner; and Teresa Maledy, Commerce Bank president), solicited input from the community about priorities for library service. The team received responses through face-to-face public meetings in ten communities, sit-down meetings with community leaders, DBRL staff meetings and through postcards and the web site. Economic and demographic reports also provided important information. The planning team, with help from a professional library planning consultant, Ellen Miller, crafted the resulting plan.

Planning Chair Rosie Gerding said this of the strategic plan, "This plan is intended to cover the next eight years: from now until 2017. That's the date when the Columbia district will pay off the last of the debt on the Columbia Public Library, and that brings with it the opportunity for the boards to start discussing other possibilities for district boundaries. Whatever the boards choose to do at that time, we felt like that would be a logical time to end this plan."

She also added that library services are highly valued in the regional system. “During the strategic planning process, we heard two important recurring messages. First, the public told us that DBRL has an excellent staff and administration who work well together and on behalf of our diverse communities. Second, the public clearly stated that they want more library services– increased hours, greater access and more customer convenience."