In a period of another proposed school merger vote and a declining state and regional population, a longtime local library is looking to ignore the trend, with an expansion in its near future.
The Worcester-Schenevus Library, found today at 170 Main St. in Worcester, is well over a century old, and has seen remarkable growth in just the last four years, with more to come this spring.
Diane Addesso, president of the Worcester-Schenevus Library Board of Trustees, said the library is in the process of acquiring the Worcester Presbyterian Church, next door. The church officially closed in the fall of 2021, due to a decline in membership.
The church leaders made an offer to the library, and the library board was bit hesitant about taking on another building. The leaders, in making the donation said if the library couldn’t sustain the building, the library could sell it and keep the money. The church members, if they had sold the property themselves, knew that any proceeds from the sale would not be returned to benefit Worcester in any form.
“We decided, let’s try it,” Addesso said about the opportunity this week. The library was able to seek grant funding to pay for the maintenance, insurance and other costs to keep the church building safe, for at least one year. The library can begin using the church once the required legal transition of decommissioning a church is completed. For the library, it can’t come soon enough.
“People have a lot of ideas on what we can use this church building for,” Addesso said. “In the library building itself, there is a Tai Chi class. It got filled in one day. If we go to the church, we could double the enrollment. We had a watercolor class, and that got filled up in one day. We’d like to do a cooking class, because there’s a nice kitchen in the church building. There’s a farmers’ market in Schenevus, and it would like to continue operating through the winter. That could happen here. It’s a great venue to rent out for events, such as weddings and parties. It’s a great space, with arched ceilings, and it’s in pretty good shape.”
The current library building is limited in space, although it is an improvement over what the library had only four years ago. At that time it was two cramped rooms in the Wieting Building at 168 Main St., established as the Worcester Free Library in 1910. The library still uses those rooms as a used bookstore, open noon to 4 p.m. Fridays and 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturdays. It is operated by the Friends of the Library group.
“People love it,” Addesso said. “We have a lot of people who go there instead of the library, because they like to shop and own their books, rather than deal with return deadlines. We get a lot of donations from it.” It was open on Saturdays at first, but because of its popularity, Fridays were added.
The library bought 170 Main St. in 2013. It had been an apartment building for decades, and through a series of grants was renovated and opened as a library in 2019.
The Worcester-Schenevus Library made all those moves to follow a trend with many public libraries across the nation, by going beyond being just a place to lend books and other media, and offering community programming and outreach to the general public.
Addesso added that the library has an art exhibit every month, as well as regular displays by both the Worcester and town of Maryland Historical Societies. The Quarter Inch Quilters Club has been making tote bags and donating them to the library to sell. She said she hopes that among the first uses of the church building this year will be a quilt show by the club.
For almost all the last 50 years, the church had been the host of the popular Worcester Strawberry Festival, recently taken on by the library, as a benefit. The tradition will continue this June.
Addesso said ideas for new programs at the library are encouraged and welcomed from the Worcester and Schenevus areas. Visit the library in person or visit its website at worcesterfreelibrary.org or Facebook page at facebook.com/WorcesterSchenevus/.