By ALIYAH CONNER
Tiger Media Network
Last weekend, the Friends of the Hays Public Library hosted a used book sale for their members and the rest of the community. The library’s event room was filled with old library books and donated books that people could purchase for $5 a bag.
Friends of the HPL President Cindy Lightle ran the event while Treasurer Stacy Sutter and other members helped people check out and kept the books stocked.
“We support the library, just about anything they need,” Lightle said.
With this event, the library has the chance to get rid of older, unused books and replace them with recently published, higher-quality books.
“When you want new books in the library, you have to get rid of the old books,” Lightle said. “Which doesn’t mean that they’re horribly old, but they’re being replaced and then we have to help the library sell them.”
After the sale, Friends of the Hays Public Library boxes up any unsold books and finds a place to donate them. Their goal is not to let any books get thrown away.
The Friends of the Hays Public Library supports the library in many other ways, including running the library’s bookstore. The options for buying books in person in Hays are very limited.
“We do support the bookstore here, which is one of the few places in Hays that you can buy a book and we keep fairly recent books in the bookstore and a lot of people really, really like it,” Lightle said.
Membership to Friends of the Hays Public Library is $15 a year and is a great way to support the Hays community. They strive to create a library that promotes growth, development, and more opportunities for everyone. Members also receive benefits such as a 10% discount at the bookstore, early access to book sales, and an invitation to an annual meeting where they can share their opinions on library planning and innovations.
Joining gives members the chance to support and give back to their library with their time. Every donation, membership, and book sale goes to the library and helps make it a better place for everyone.
More information about Friends of the Hays Public Library and the bookstore is available here.