Thanks to the gracious generosity of the T. Kendall Hunt Family Foundation, Oak Park library cardholders have gained access to double the number of mobile hotspots and Chromebooks to borrow and use anywhere.
Using the foundation’s gift, the library purchased more devices for checkout that in turn gave more Oak Park patrons free access to the Internet — important when due to the pandemic tech inventory was often in short supply and nearly all public spaces offering free WiFi remained closed due to COVID-19.
The first Oak Park cardholder to borrow a library laptop and hotspot for offsite use during COVID-19 was a Housing Forward client. At self-service pickup, he told library staff he had relied on public computer access before the pandemic. Another Oak Park cardholder received her mobile hotspot by U.S.P.S. mail at her Oak Park address (as librarians worked behind the scenes to fulfill requests when buildings were closed to the public). She later emailed the library to share her thanks and the fact that she and her daughter “are so relieved to have an Internet signal that is not constantly interrupted by her dad who is also working from home!”
To learn more about how you can support your neighbors through gifts that help our community keep learning and stay connected during difficult times, visit oppl.org/give.
