Rain, Rain, Go Away

The amount of rain that Ohio has experienced this past week served to remind me that while I was craving some relief from the drought in the past, I am now more than ready for the rain to go away. The flooding has wreaked havoc on many of my surrounding communities, and many school beginnings have been delayed. I have a wall of floor-to-ceiling windows in my office and I got to witness the fury of Mother Nature in full view. What an awsome sight! My library was fortunate to only get two or three leaks. It is a regular duty to patrol the library in search of leaks when it rains heavily. We have had several serious ones in the past. We have some persistent places that just won't go away. So the local roofing company knows the library very well. Storms like the ones we have experienced in the last two weeks reinforce the critical importance of a library having a disaster response plan in place. Whether you have a faulty lighting system or a serious flooding problem, administrators need to work closely with their maintenance and public safety departments to ensure that patrons as well as the collections are protected as much as possible. Yesterday, someone asked me the elevation of the library above the flood plain of the creek that runs near us. I admit, I never considered the creek ever flooding enough to reach the library, but after that last storm, I think I'll go have a talk with the Maintenance Department, just to be sure.