Davenport Library moving Special Collections upstairs; staff outline digitization projects, new shelving and community partnerships

Davenport City — Catherine Buena, special collections supervisor for the Davenport Public Library, told the board June 17 that Special Collections staff are moving offices to the library’s second floor and will begin relocating portions of the collections next week as part of a phased move to improve public access and storage.

Buena said the department is moving office spaces first and then collections: "So right now, we're moving most of our office spaces up, right now, and then, next week, we'll be starting to move our collections," she said. The move will not place all materials on the second floor; large items and map cases will remain in secure compact shelving in the department’s current closed-stack area.

Why it matters: The realignment is intended to create better public access to special collections materials, expand storage using compact shelving, and to support digitization and preservation projects that make local-history materials available online.

What trustees heard

Buena described staffing and daily functions: the department has four full-time staff members including Buena as special collections supervisor, Katie Reinhart as special collections librarian, Amy Driscoll as special collections archivist (who also…