Apr 4, 2017 2 min read

Greene County Library patrons who are homebound will now be able to use the Greene Library System’s new Library-by-Mail service.

Residents with a temporary or long-term illness, physical disability or elderly residents who no longer drive will be able to order library materials and get them by mail.

“There’s several people who have elderly parents and come to get the library material for their parents,” said Therese Barry, system administrator. “This would save them that trip.”

Eligible patrons can order up to two materials at once, which will arrive in a reusable canvas bag. When finished with them, patrons can return them by putting them back in the mailing bag with a new request sheet. They will flip the address card over, so the return postage to the library is showing.

The library system will pay for the bags and the postage for the new mail service, while the individual libraries, Eva K. Bowlby Public Library in Waynesburg and Flenniken Public Library in Carmichaels, will interact with their patrons’ requests and services.

Barry said the library system used to have an “outreach coordinator,” who would go to nursing homes and senior centers to provide library services and programs. That employee also delivered materials to patrons that were homebound.

“The outreach coordinator left in January for another job,” Barry said. “We didn’t want to fill that position because we are waiting to see what the state budget will look like.”

Barry said it is not yet known if the library system will ever reinstate that position.

“The mail service is considerably less expensive than that position,” she said.

A packet of information will be sent to potential patrons, who will then fill out an application and return it to their library. Anyone interested in the service can contact one of the libraries for more information, at 724-627-9776 for Bowlby, or 724-966-5263 for Flenniken.