By Keith Lacey
Gorgeous summer weather helped attract another nice crowd last Saturday as the Friends of the Oliver Library held another successful summer book sale event.
Dozens of local residents and tourists flocked to the parking lot outside the Oliver branch of the Okanagan Regional Library throughout the day on Saturday and purchased hundreds of books, all of which were donated by local residents, said event organizer Heather Frank.
The Friends of the Oliver Library (FOTOL) is an independent, non-profit organization whose purpose includes focusing public attention on our local library and its needs. They also raise funds to supplement and/or enhance available funding to make the library a place of great pride in the community.
This is the 19th consecutive year the Friends of the Oliver Library – a group with close to 40 members – has held a summer book sale, said Frank.
“All proceeds from the book sale go to support the (children’s) Summer Reading Program at the Oliver library … and to help out with a few other things (entertainment) run by the library staff,” she said. “The book sale usually raises in the neighbourhood of $2,000, sometimes a little bit more. “It is our major fundraiser of the year for Friends of the Oliver Library and we’re just thrilled with the amount of community support we receive with our book sale every single year.”
This year the sale raised nearly $2,100. Books were selling for 50 cents for a paperback and $1 for a hard cover book earlier in the day, and then boxes of 12 books were selling for $5 apiece later in the day, said Frank.
At the end of the book sale, all remaining books are donated to the Canadian Diabetes Clothesline Program for resale. None of the books end up at the landfill, Frank pointed out.
“It’s wonderful that we’re able to help another community group raise a few dollars by selling the books, instead of just bringing them to the local landfill,” she said.
Frank and event co-chair Marianne Hutterli thanked all of those who attended the summer book sale for supporting the event and helping raise much needed funds to ensure quality programming remains in place at the Oliver public library.
