Lenox Library Trustees Elect Co-Chairs, Approve Ramsdale Youth Funds Amid Grant Pressure

LENOX — June 10, 2026 — Lenox Library Trustees elect co-chairs and approve Ramsdale youth funding at June 10 meeting. The Board of Library Trustees unanimously elected Lauren Clark and Laura Mars as co-chairs and Sharon Shalow as secretary-treasurer in separate 5-0 roll-call votes, completing the board's annual reorganization. The board also voted 5-0 to appropriate $500 from Ramsdale branch donation funds for youth programming — a response to a town-allocated annual budget of roughly $800 that a $475 movie license renewal would nearly exhaust. Trustee Patrick Hollenbeck sounded an extended alarm about the pace of public outreach for the Ramsdale Library renovation project, warning that a Massachusetts Board of Library Commissioners construction grant cycle runs approximately eight years and that a failed town meeting vote would bar the Mason Library branch from receiving its own state grant until the mid-2050s. "We can't miss this summer," Hollenbeck said. "It's the last summer before we go to town meeting." The board accepted a donated mural for the children's program room 5-0 but did not reach agreement on whether to hold a special meeting before the July 1 regular session or to send the Select Board a letter about the future of the Ramsdale Building Committee.