A public library is established under state enabling laws or regulations to serve a community, district, or region, and provides at least the following:
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an organized collection of printed or other library materials, or a combination thereof;
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paid staff;
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an established schedule in which services of the staff are available to the public;
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the facilities necessary to support such a collection, staff, and schedule, and
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is supported in whole or in part with public funds.
There may be only one public library in a community or there may be a public library system. Just as a school system has elementary and secondary schools, a public library that administers a branch, a bookmobile, a central library, and/ or a books-by-mail service is called a public library system.
A central library may be the one public library in a community or it may be the library which is the operational center of a public library system. Usually all processing is centralized here and the principal collections are housed here. A central library is synonymous with a main library. A public library system does not have more than one central library.
A branch library is a library within a library system which has at least all of the following:
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separate quarters;
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an organized collection of library materials;
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paid staff; and
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regularly scheduled hours for being open to the public.
A bookmobile is a traveling branch library. It consists of at least all of the following:
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a truck or van that carries an organized collection of library materials;
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paid staff; and
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regularly scheduled hours (bookmobile stops) for being open to the public.
Books-by-Mail is a direct mail order service which provides books and other library materials. Books-by-mail typically serves rural residents, the disabled, the homebound, and others without access to a public library. Requests for materials are usually received by mail and by telephone only.
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