Davenport City Council and Library Board Joint Meeting - July 2, 2026
Davenport City Council and Library Board Joint Meeting - July 2, 2026
This joint meeting between the Davenport City Council and the Library Board of Trustees on July 2, 2026, provided an opportunity for the council to hear from the library board about their role, services, and challenges. Discussions covered library accreditation, community programs, legislative issues, and ways to improve collaboration and communication.
Discussion Items
- Library Board Introduction: Board members introduced themselves and explained their role as a buffer between the council and library administration, handling controversies before they reach the council. They emphasized maintaining accreditation through monthly policy reviews.
- Library Director Absence: The library director was unable to attend due to illness from a scout trip.
- Council Support for Library Services: Multiple council members expressed strong support for the library, noting its importance to the community, including programs for children (story time, Christmas movies), the library of things (shovels, GoPros, etc.), notary services, and online resources. Council member Joe mentioned using the library's one-on-one librarian service to help with spreadsheets during his campaign.
- Communication and Advertising: Council members highlighted that many services (e.g., rent-a-tool, GoPro, notary) were not widely known, and urged the library to advertise more aggressively through social media and at community events. The board noted that staff already promote services at school events and through the bookmobile.
- Legislative Update: The city administrator reported that during the past legislative session, a bill was introduced to transfer library commission authority to the city council. The metro coalition of larger cities opposed it, and the bill did not advance. The council expressed relief, noting they prefer the library to operate independently.
- Surveys and Feedback: The board reported that the library receives positive feedback from the public, with monthly reports to the board. The city's citizen survey consistently ranks the library in the top three city services. The board also conducts its own surveys on specific service areas.
- Strategic Collaboration: Council member Tim asked about strengthening collaboration between the city and library for economic development and quality of life. The board suggested including the library in city data-sharing and promoting library resources to businesses (e.g., small business tools).
- Creative Programming Ideas: Council members shared ideas for library events, including a "Night at the Museum" style slumber party and a stuffie sleepover event that had generated high engagement. The library board noted they have already run a successful stuffie sleepover.
- Annual Meeting Discussion: It was noted that this joint meeting had not occurred since before COVID. Council and board agreed it would be valuable to make it an annual event, as per city code. The library liaison (previously present virtually) was mentioned as a way to maintain regular communication.
Key Outcomes
- Agreement to hold annual joint meetings between the City Council and Library Board, to be scheduled regularly.
- Directive to improve advertising of library services, especially less-known offerings like the library of things and notary service.
- Noted that the legislative bill to transfer library authority did not pass and that the council supports the library's independent governance.
- The library board announced a fundraiser on September 26 (year unspecified) for the library foundation, with a new store component.
Meeting Transcript
This conference will now be recorded. Tim, do you have anything before we start? Okay. Okay. Why don't we do introductions? Uh all the grip will be here and you just call me. He went to the wrong place. He's going to do the right place. I almost did the same thing. So I don't know. This maybe we'll start with you and go all the way around the room. Hi, I'm Casey Shipley. I'm the office and facilities manager at the library. And recording the meeting. Jay Mercaller, Alden Willem. I'm Hudley Bell or PC below. John Well, F Port Portal. Jason Gordon Mayor. I'm Tommy, friends of the library trustees. Juilbinders. Or how the way that we would are. Oh, I guess you can name off the board of trustees. Yeah. Uh starting next month for the states for the library. And uh city administrator with city major. You want to are you doing this like a more assistant? Well, I wanted to say thank you to all of the members of the council and the mayor certainly not. I know this is one more meeting, and she can ask to you so then there I it's about so do appreciate you coming. Unfortunately, the library director was on a scout trip with his children and caught a sickness and did not want to spread his churches here today after everyone is happy about not getting sick. So with that, he had a slight presentation. I just kind of wanted to emphasize the library board and administration. We kind of serve in way kind of as a buffer for the council, and that were doing certain things, and some ways, for example, there have been occasion controversies about say an event happened, and they've kind of sort of done us, so we kind of filter that before it would come to the council, which is kind of how I think most of the boards and commissions kind of work. One of the things we do do is we work very hard to maintain accreditation. I think there should be in front of you. Some of them some of them state by but they all have a certain requirements. So we have a system in place where every month we will have a certain policy will come to us for review. We'll talk about it in the following month. Sometimes there are not, but sometimes there are so yeah, that's uh you know, that is really the main extent what from my perspective presentation we can make. Like I say, Jeff had a little bit more, and but I would be interested to hear from the council mayor, your perspective. Sure, what things you would like from us, yeah. Well, and uh we do have to do for my six months today. perspective presentation we can make like I say Jeff a little bit more and but I would be interested to hear you know from the council mayor your perspective sure what things you would like from us yeah well and uh we do have two as I do for six months today new wish I guess so uh you know one of those onboarding um things that happens really then probably is just knowing uh what each one of the commissions and the boards that we have do and what their purview is and what the role responsibility is so um I I don't know if my colleagues have your questions I mean we're very proud of our libraries so got uh life who's a ferocious feeder and she's got a couple of great she's just always at the library the story hour the downtown library the screen so we're big fans to yourself generally oh just log in very you um it's gonna the library director it's sick unfortunately um yeah I'll maybe to my colleagues see if they've got any questions or comments I'm sorry I will say that even though I'm this is my second term I've never met the library board before so this is this is great um I can throw out Grim but um we utilized the library tremendously until you were I'm sorry didn't our city layers on to the having work I do see the utilization and I love that you know I assign that for library card again but so long uh it's grew a little bit learning out of mom um but in I mean the programs that we offer are fantastic and I love seeing all of that and everything that we offer on social media it it is a daily almost daily that I see something like so that's easy um one of the things to do and management from C2 work very hard with what used to be called the friends of the library they're now called library foundation um they raise money and they frequently will will fund a lot of those programs uh there are certain programs that they they fund they have been funding for years they've added others so yes and then we also look we have added the library of thing you can like this the space room shovel various kinds of things like that so we found through our contacts with other library systems and other places have done that so we've explored that and like for example in that case we went forward I think the friends gave us the money and then we acquired the various items that are in our library of things which is just I just think is another useful tool you know that you know people could come and use you know maybe they don't always need a shovel or maybe you're always the light certain things and so hopefully we have some enough those kinds of things that people can use those that is just another way they can feel like they belong to the can if I'm in um the beauty of this is we have these kinds of aspects as we said for that matter uh but somewhere if you want to go into vacation it'd be how a co-book GoPro can you know what I mean the extension the extension of items is so extensive that you can apply it to all kinds of situations and events you know and it's free it's free for you to check out and that's what we'd be building as a foundation process and as we're talking about the foundation I'm maybe feeling away from the topic but I do want to share that we do have a one razor on September 26th which is every foundation so please do talk you're really thank you. So please do talk you're really good. Thank you. It's going to be uh going to be like it was last year. Yes, with a new store. Yeah, new store. Which is very interesting to us. The way to play that sort of played out the super industry. Yeah, mystery.
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