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•CITY OF SOUTH BEND OFFICE OF THE CLERK Committee Chair Ferlic gave the floor back to the petitioner. Mr. Winks stated, At this point in time, we have no indication from our Tax Department if we were going to take advantage of that or not. We would need to go back and look at it and decide if we should or should not take advantage of it. Thank you for your help. Due to a lack of quorum, Bill No. 18-66 was sent to the full Council with no recommendation. Update: St.Joseph County Public Library (15 minutes) Debra Futa, Executive Director of the St. Joseph County Public Library with offices located at 304 S. Main Street, South Bend, IN, stated, I want to begin by talking about the role of the public library these days (referencing a slide in a presentation which is available in the City Clerk's Office). I think it is natural that when you think of books you think of the public library. Digital, paper and audio will always be a big part of what we offer and that will never go away, but we also serve in a lot of other ways. As an economic development agent, we address literacy, technology skills, small business development and quality of life. As a digital literacy provider and trainer, we are helping people find and use digital content. Our digital lab helps people turn their creative ideas into a reality and our community uses our connectivity to help them live their lives. The Learning Center is really about learning for a lifetime. We are involved with everything from helping parents interact with their young children to providing training, classes and information programs. One(1)of the most recent programs is how to identify fake news. We have Spanish language classes that are full, we do sign language classes, yoga classes and so much more. And as a commons, it is really a place for people to meet and discuss and to come together. That is probably one (1) of the most important things we do, right now, where everyone is welcome. She continued, I wanted to also talk about usage. When people think nobody uses libraries anymore, these (referencing a slide in the presentation) are our 2017 numbers and I wanted to do this just really quickly. 114,000 people have a library card. Of those, 68,000 live in South Bend. Our fast Wi-Fi means people can come and do all kinds of things. That is a piece of the digital inclusion that we partnered with the City on for digital inclusion sites. 423,000 people used our Wi-Fi last year and those were from devices they were bringing in. In addition to that, 178,000 computer hours were used where people were coming in and using a library computer to do something. We had 1,070 programs and 3,200 groups met in the library in 2017 and that is really where we need the space. She went on, Library programs begin almost from birth. We provide 'Talk with the Baby' programs and you can see the pike on the upper right(referencing a slide in the presentation),there were four hundred and thirteen(413)story hours last year that 14,000 preschool children attended. We included the Local Feeding Kids, Growing Minds because we wanted to say we don't just serve people at the Main Branch of the Library. Feeding Kids, Growing Minds is a program we recently piloted at the LaSalle branch. We have kids who come in after school and stay until we close. So these kids are staying until 6:00 p.m. or 8:00 p.m. and they don't eat. They are hungry. Hungry kids can't learn and they act out. So what we've done is partner with a local hotel where they drop off healthy snacks after school on their way to the airport and it is working.We are going to turn that into a program that works at other locations as well. This was the pilot. EXCELLENCE ACCOUNTABILITY INNOVATION INCLUSION EMPOWERMENT 455 County-City Building 227W.Jefferson Bvld South Bend,Indiana 46601 p 574.235.9221 f 574.235.9173 TTD574.235.5567 www.southbendin.gov 7