Report: The State of Small & Rural Libraries

The Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) just published a new brief, The State of Small and Rural Libraries in the United States. This report provides the agency’s first focused analysis of trends for rural and small library services. The sheer number of libraries in this category is one significant finding. Their research revealed that 77.1% of all public libraries are considered small and that 46 million people (that’s 15.4% of the population) are served by these libraries. This publication seems particularly relevant in this part of the country since this year’s conference of The Association for Rural & Small Libraries (ARSL) is currently being held in Omaha. Also significant, of course, is the fact that 58% of all public libraries in Nebraska serve populations of under 1,000.