Coast Chronicles: Timberland Library, Ocean Park Branch ‘Refresh’

Published 4:47 pm Friday, July 25, 2025

What the heck is a “refresh”?

Last week in the community room of our beloved Timberland Library in Ocean Park, a group of gray-haired women voiced their unmitigated support to the library’s board of trustees. Pacific County’s representative Toni Gwin called the meeting to order and laid out the terms of the line-up of speakers.

Barbara Bate led off and gave a full-throated cheer for the continued need for actual books in the library. Barbara has a Ph.D. in communications and she also requested that there be more of a two-way street of conversation between trustees and community members. (This was partially in response to a string of controversy regarding the changes at the Timberland Library branch in Naselle, as recorded in letters to the editor in the Chinook Observer in the fall of 2024.)

Let’s talk about what is actually going on. On the books for awhile, the Ocean Beach branch of our library has been scheduled for a so-called “refresh.” It’s a good thing, folks. The whole library will have new carpet and flooring, there will be new furniture, restrooms will be upgraded, lighting will be improved, and some areas will be repainted. While this is all taking place, the library will be closed, probably for about four months. But thanks to the advocacy of Timberland Regional Library Manager Michelle Zilli, there will be an alternative space for our library facility in the interim.

Temporary library space

“I was really adamant about the Ocean Park community needing a place for the library while the refresh happens,” Michelle said in a conversation with me by phone. “We’ve known this was coming for awhile, and we shared with patrons that it would take place toward the end of summer. Well, we just got the dates. The regular library will be closed starting Monday, Aug. 16.”

“But again, I knew that we would need an alternative space. Over 50% of our library patrons are between the ages of 60 and 80. I didn’t want our patrons to have to drive all the way to Ilwaco during our winter months. So beginning around Sept. 2 — maybe a but earlier, we have a lot of packing to do — we’ll have a temporary library space at 1910 Bay Ave., right next to Forgotten Treasures, the antique store.”

“It won’t be the full set off services — there isn’t room — but it will have computers, printers and fax, space for staff desks, six to eight displays shelves for a small browsing collection. You’ll be able to come pick up books on hold or “lucky days” books. We will have some DVDs and picture books. And we’ll have some staff there, but we’re still working out what the hours will be. We won’t have ‘extended access.’” [This is that magic card that lets you into the library at times when it is closed, something I cherish.]

Michelle worked hard to find a place that was still downtown and close enough to the original library location so people could walk to the temporary library if needed.

Other library news

I have to admit I’ve never attended a library board of trustees meeting before. I’ve just taken for granted the fact that we have an amazing library in our little corner of the world. One of my favorite personal library stories is the time I went in looking for the 1983 environmental impact report issued by the U.S. Army about the area of Central Washington where I grew up, called the Columbia Basin shrub-steppe. Not only did our friendly local librarians find a copy for me — and not in Washington state anywhere, but in an obscure environmental library in the Midwest — but they also figured out a way to copy the whole 400 page document for a research project I was working on by giving me two months’ “copy credit” before I left for a trip.

Anyway, I found out some even more phenomenal information by speaking after the meeting to Andrea Heisel, Timberland Library Services director. How many of us have ever considered how a library stocks its shelves, or how book rotations or new book placement works? Not I. Well, Andrea filled me in on a set of software recently purchased by the Timberland Libraries that automates these kinds of processes in an incredibly efficient way.

Intelligent materials Management System software (IMMS — the staff pronounces it like MMs, as in M and Ms) was developed in Denmark. It “uses data to track the location of every item, automates tasks like sorting and holds management, and optimizes material flow between branches.” This incredible software tells managers if they have the need for more pictures books, for instance, and automates sending those kinds of texts to the right branch and to the right shelf in the right branch. It sets parameters that moves books around, allowing libraries to refresh their book selections on the shelves reducing “stagnation;” and it analyses which branches need more or less of certain categories of books: more mysteries or biographies or adult fiction, for instance.

“It knows exactly what’s on our shelves,” Andrea says. “It works sort of like the inventory scanning in a grocery store. Before we’d be doing this all by hand — almost like eenie meenie miney moe—what kind of books do we need more of or what do we need to weed out? This product was created in Denmark and Ryan Williams, IT Administrator, and I had been looking for awhile for a product that would automate these kinds of tasks. We call Ryan our library futurist— he’s worked for Timberland for 31 years! Anyway, we’re only one of a few library systems that have installed this software to date.”

I ask, “Even Seattle Public Library doesn’t have this sophisticated IMMS?” “No!” she says.

So, behind the scenes, our library administration and staff are constantly working to improve our libraries and our user experience. I can’t express how fortunate we are to have such a forward thinking and dedicated group of professional guiding our local Timberland Libraries.

Just a note that we have long been a reading community. Ocean Park had a library that began over 125 years ago as a small collection of books moving from house to house, until in 1940 the library found a permanent home at the Ocean Park Elementary School. Then in 1968, our little community library became part of the Timberland Regional Library District. So now we can have staff like Bill Tubbs (1935-2009), an exceptional journalist, bagpiper, who worked at the library for many years; and events like Steffi Thomas, a fantasy author, performing at the branch with a Pokemon character; Jim Tweedy reading poetry; historical displays in the case by the door; and all variety of group meetings in the community room.

What services does a small town community need to remain vital and sustain itself? Near the top of the list must be a library.