Library Accessibility and Improvement Grants

Great news!! The Department of Finance has just posted a list of capital requests submitted by state agencies and political subdivisions (local governments). The Minnesota Department of Education has requested $10 million for Library Accessibility and Improvement Grants. This is by far the largest request that MDE has ever made for this grant program. Check it out here.

The House and Senate Capital Investment Committees will use the list of requests to plan their tours of potential capital projects this fall. This is the first step toward receiving bonding money in the 2008 legislative session. If you have a library project that would be a good candidate for a tour by legislators, please contact Elaine Keefe. The ideal project would be one where the need for a new or remodeled library would be obvious to a non-librarian, and where local planning, both for the design of the building and for securing the local portion of the funding, are fairly well developed.