OPL's Kathy O'Malley Receives 2024 Library All Star Award

OLEAN, NY — The Western New York Library Resource Council names one person annually for its Library All Star Award, someone at any staffing level who contributes to a welcoming library atmosphere.

The 2024 recipient, Kathy O’Malley, coordinator of children and family services at the Olean Public Library, believes it belongs to the library as a whole.

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O’Malley, an Olean native, has worked at the library for almost 25 years. The Friends of the Library nominated O’Malley for her dedication to the children’s and family programs at the library.

“It means a lot to me that I was even nominated,” O’Malley said.

Among the library's offerings for children is “Reading can be Ruff,” which gives youngsters the opportunity to read with therapy dogs.

More than 300 children came through their summer reading program this year, O’Malley said.

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“I’ve worked really hard to try to make the children’s area a welcoming, safe place for kids. [Somewhere] kids can come and just feel special every time,” she said.

All the staff members, from the library director to the building monitors, are involved 100% in each program or event, O’Malley said.

Right now, the library is preparing to host some Halloween-themed events for youngsters to enjoy, O’Malley said.

Among those events is the Oct. 26 noontime Creepy Crawly Halloween with REPCO Wildlife giving attendees the chance to see snakes, lizards, turtles, tarantulas and scorpions and the Oct. 29, 4 p.m., Jerry Schneider’s Wonderful World of Bats, presented through photos, slides and taped bat calls.

The library also schedules events and programs for teens and adults, and O’Malley believes such offerings are among the things community members love most about the library.

“We offer so much more than books, magazines, newspapers," she said. “We have a maker space with 3D printers, and we started sewing [class] and cooking classes. We do tons of outreach within the community, like book clubs.”

A lot of public libraries have become community hubs, O’Malley said, adding that she knows people who came to the library as babies themselves and now bring their own kiddos to the library.

“[The library] is a nice place for families to come and feel safe and be exposed to other services they might not even know of and take advantage of what we have to offer,” she said.

O’Malley said the community lets the library know how much they appreciate the library’s efforts through social media or face-to-face interaction. Her dedication is noticed by the community and her coworkers, something the Library All Star Award highlights.

“I really enjoy the kids," she said. “I feel that it’s important to have kids get started [reading] right from birth even.”

As for the future of the library, O’Malley said she only sees it getting better and better.

“We really do try to do new and different things," O'Malley said. "Even if we think it might be a flub, we try to keep up with new programming, new concepts. We really have a lot to offer, and I think people are really taking advantage of it, and I think that is a great thing.”

The award ceremony will be on Oct 22 at 2:45 p.m. in the National Comedy Center in Jamestown.

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