Planning

Welcome!

Library Staff and the Library's Trustees are excited to share news of new projects aimed at connecting with you, our community, to improve our Berkeley Public Library buildings, services, and programs. Please check back on this page for updates and new projects. Please let me know what you think of the library's plans, your opinion is important to us. Tess Mayer, Director of Library Services.

Executive Summary of Spring 2019 Community Survey

In spring of 2019, the Library surveyed the community to help identify how the organization could better serve community members. More than 4,000 people responded to the survey. The following executive summary is intended to help the Library use information from the survey to effectively shape its future budget, develop service priorities, and design operational practices and policies.

Central Library Space Improvements

Project Update - January 2020
Project Update - December 2019
Project Update - June 2016

More Information about the Central Library Space Improvements

Annual Report

2019-2020 Strategic Priorities and Activities

The City of Berkeley's draft Strategic Plan has established nine (9) long-term strategic goals for City services. The Library has identified three (3) key goals from the plan that significantly relate to the Library’s mission:

  • Provide state-of the-art, well maintained infrastructure, amenities, and facilities
  • Champion and demonstrate social and racial equity
  • Provide excellent, timely, easily-accessible service and information to the community

Additionally, the Library identified the goal of supporting community safety and wellness and the need to continue to optimize internal communications.

The Library has identified a number of operational initiatives and activities designed to help meet these goals: 

2020 Strategic Goals

BPL Strategic Plans 2008 - 2017

Collection Management

Collection Management Plan

The heart and soul of the Library is its collection of books, movies, and music, inlcuding the physical collection (books, CDs, magazines, DVDs, etc.) along with a vast collection of materials accessible via downloading or streaming. The Library's collection management plan is a living document developed to fulfill the Library's Collection Management Policy.

The plan details the role of staff, strategies used, selection guidelines, deselection criteria, and other operational elements, procedures, and practices related to collections.The plan was informed by a community survey of over 4,000 patrons and is used by the Library to perform its everyday collection management work. The Library is dedicated to improving the community's experience of its collections and the plan is updated as needed as community needs change, and as new approaches to fufilling these needs are identified.

Branch Improvement Program

Information about Measure FF and individual branch projects.
Information about Sustainable Spaces.