New director Amanda Borden unveils vision for Hoover Public Library

When Amanda Borden was 21 years old and working toward a master’s degree in library science at the University of Alabama, some of her classes were boring her — until Hoover Library Director Linda Andrews came to speak to one of them.

Andrews wasn’t the stereotypical librarian who stares down anyone who dares to make noise in her library. Instead, she made her library a fun and engaging place — full of life.

“It was just like it clicked,” Borden said. “I knew I wanted to work for her and for the Hoover library. And if I couldn’t, I wanted to do what she had done here in another library.”

Borden was able to snag an internship at the Hoover Public Library in the spring of 1993 and later a full-time job. And come Jan. 1, Borden will succeed Andrews as director, becoming only the second director the library has ever had in its 33 years.

“I have worked for this all my life,” Borden said. “It’s my dream job … I’m really just on top of the world.”

Borden said Andrews has been her mentor and taught her that customer service should be the No. 1 priority of any library.

No shushing

“We believe when people come to the Hoover library, they would not want to see another stereotypical librarian that tells them to shush,” Borden said. “We believe they want to see a nice, smiling librarian that says, “How can I help you?”

The Hoover library, with 100 or so employees, already has a very customer-driven staff, she said. “They’re creative, innovative, passionate and driven.”

However, Borden would like to implement cross training to improve employees’ knowledge about areas outside their department, she said. For example, some employees in the fiction department may not be able to answer patrons’ questions about the children’s department and vice versa, she said. “Eventually, I would like to see everyone at every desk be able to answer every question.”

Borden said she hopes to carry on the legacy that Andrews created and developed at the Hoover library over the past three decades — serving the public and making the library a community center where people gather not only to read, research or study, but also to socialize, enjoy music and art, and even do business.

She wants to encourage more events like the Sci Fi Fantasy Fest that drew more than 2,100 people to the library over three days in October, she said.

She also wants to continue encouraging lifelong learning, with book clubs, English classes for immigrants and educational programs, she said. And early literacy for children also will be a priority, Borden said.

“Study after study has shown that if a child is read to in the first five years in life, they are more successful in school, so we consider it our mission to get them ready for school” she said.

The Hoover library has numerous programs designed specifically for preschoolers of different ages.

Borden said she wants to make sure the library stays relevant — keeping up with technology trends and pop culture so the library can appeal to people. She wants to create private workspaces for tutoring and business meetings.

Library branches?

Borden also thinks it’s time to begin considering ways to better serve people who live far away from the library. “People in the eastern part of town have to drive 30 minutes to reach the library,” she said. “That’s not convenient.”

Carrie Steinmehl, the technology coordinator at the library, already is working on a grant application so the library could install off-site book retrieval and return centers in remote areas. That would allow people to order books online, have them delivered to the pickup location by a courier and then return the books to same location instead of having to drive all the way to the library.

However, that is really a Band-Aid, Borden said. “What we really need are branches,” she said.

Bowling Green, Kentucky has 58,000 residents and five library locations, and Hattiesburg, Mississippi has 50,000 residents and three locations, she said. Hoover has more than 80,000 people spread out over 48 square miles and only one library location, she said.

“I believe we can do better, and I think the city is ripe for it,” Borden said. “I believe that our new leadership is looking for new ideas, and I believe that they would be receptive to it.”

Leadership transition

Borden has worked at the Hoover library for nearly 16 years and been an assistant director for more than 10 years.

While Borden was the only applicant for the director’s job, Library Board Chairwoman Sara Rast said Borden was the most qualified person. Library Board members indicated when they posted the director’s job vacancy that they wanted someone with experience at the Hoover library.

The other longtime assistant director, Patricia Guarino, indicated from the beginning that she would not seek the director’s job, saying it might not be too many years until she retires as well.

That made the decision easy for the Library Board, board member Michael Krawcheck said. One of the best things a leader can do is train someone who can do the leader’s job when the leader leaves, and Andrews aptly established a line of succession as she trained both Borden and Guarino, he said.

Borden is a natural for the director’s job, and the fact that Guarino will stay on to assist Borden is a blessing, he said.

“You complement each other,” he told the two women during the November board meeting. “We have a culture here that you two understand, and it’s very important that that culture be understood and continue to be perpetuated. … To me, it’s a wonderful transition.”

Rast said the Library Board, Andrews and her staff have worked hard to build a library where everyone feels welcome and the board doesn’t want to do anything to change that. “We want to keep it as close to we can as to how it has been,” she said.

Borden is the right fit to maintain the library’s success, Rast said.

Not only is she well-trained by Andrews, but she also has a master’s degree in library science, 20 years under her belt as an administrator and an understanding of how important it is to keep a balanced budget, Rast said.

“If we could clone Linda, we would have gotten us another Linda, but this is as close as we could get,” Rast said.

Work history

Borden said she’s thrilled and excited to get the appointment and looks forward to working with the rest of the library staff and city leadership in the future. She has been preparing herself for this job for a long time, she said.

When she finished her internship at the Hoover library in 1993, there were no full-time job openings there, so she got a job as a children’s librarian at the downtown branch of the Birmingham Public Library.

She did that job for three years and then spent three years managing the children’s department at Birmingham’s Springville Road branch and about 1½ years managing the children’s and circulation departments at the Pelham Public Library before finally landing a job at the Hoover Public Library as manager of the children’s department in 2001. After five years in that role, she was promoted in 2006 to assistant director and now oversees the 44 employees in the children’s, teen and circulation departments.

Borden, 45, lives in Hoover’s Chace Lake community with her husband, Allen, and said told the Library Board she is invested in the community and up to the task of being director. “There will be no one more committed to this library than I am,” she told them.

However, Andrews leaves behind some big shoes to fill, and “I really want to respect her legacy in the way I perform this job.”