WOODSFIELD — The Monroe County Public Library offered services throughout the COVID-19 pandemic and is ready to resume its place as a center of community life, while catering to new habits developed by patrons during the past year.

The Woodsfield facility is Monroe County’s only public library.

“We are open,” Director Kathy South said, noting the library’s precautions delayed delivering requested items.

“We’ve actually been open for some time, but all our doors are open now. We still have to quarantine our items three to four days, but that’s our cargo items that come in from other libraries because we borrow from other libraries.”

However, there is less of a wait for stock items for local patrons to borrow and return.

“We actually bought a sanitizing machine that has (ultraviolet) lights,” she said. “We put our stuff in there so we don’t have such a backlog of books, so we can move items faster.”

South said online activities are in high demand.

“We’ve actually turned on our WiFi 24/7 so people can actually just come anytime and sit outside our building,” she said.

South said patrons also have become accustomed to e-books and e-resources.

“We’ve seen patrons who normally wouldn’t have used the electronic books, they bought devices and are starting to download titles, and some of them like it pretty well.”

A summer reading program is being planned.

“It’ll start June 7. … Right now we’re not allowed to have the groups of children … so we’re calling them Cake and Make bags, for our ages 2-5,” she said. “They come in every other week and they’ll be a craft in that bag. … They’re already pre-made up for the storytime kids. … They take it home.”

South said more than 40 children have registered to participate.

Other inventive activities are also in the works. South said organizers are planning to hold group projects in the Monroe Theater.

“That will be a big enough area for us to do the social distancing,” she said, adding group activities remain high on the public’s wish-list.

“That’s where the kids get the social part of it.”

She said patrons have also continued to use the library’s computers to file taxes and complete Census forms.

“We’ve always offered our computers to people, because in our area there’s a lot of people that don’t have internet,” South said.

The library is located at 96 Home Ave. For more information, call 740-472-1954 or visit monroecounty.lib.oh.us/.