The View Royal Reading Centre will be given a much needed boost this year.
The Town of View Royal recently approved $30,000 in grant funding – 63 per cent of which will be used to pay rent and a portion to utilities.
“[It helps] so that we can keep going. We try to raise funds by selling discarded books and doing whatever fundraising we possibly can but we can’t raise enough to pay our rent,” said reading centre manager Christine Jackman.“We really rely on the Town to support us.”
Money that is leftover will be used to purchase books for the library.
For the past several years, the volunteer-run centre has only had to request $28,000, however this year rent has gone up which translates to the increase in funding needed.
Originally started in 1943 as a bookmobile, the reading centre has moved locations several times over the years. In the early 1970s, it officially became a library and moved into the View Royal Community Centre, and in the mid 1980s moved in to the basement of the View Royal town hall. In the early 2000s, it was once housed in a plaza on Admirals Walk, before eventually moving to its current location at 266 Island Hwy. in October 2015.
Now its collection has more than 11,000 books and a variety of DVDs which residents can borrow.
This year the reading centre is celebrating its 75th anniversary.
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kendra.wong@goldstream