This year, the Frisco Public Library is celebrating 25 years of service to the city. This is also the year the library released its 10-year master plan.

In the master plan, Library Director Shelley Holley said the library was tasked with the question, “What does the community want from the library?”

“If you’re going to boil it down to a single word, it was ‘more,’” she said. “They want more of what we give them now.”

The master plan pinpoints four “next steps,” most of which highlight the need for more resources:

• Continue to improve service areas the community values, such as traditional library services, technology and customer service.


• Improve awareness of library services.


• Expand services to meet current and future population needs. This includes expanding the library’s collection.


• Strengthen organizational health for improved fiscal flexibility, which includes developing nongovernmental sources of revenue.

Some actions to put these next steps into place are already in motion.

One is the planned expansion of the library with the rest of city hall. In 2015, voters passed a $37 million bond issue to expand city hall, which includes the library. The expansion would add about 150,000 square feet to city hall. Holley said the expansion’s design is underway, and construction is expected to begin in 12-18 months.

More library space will also be added to a Hyatt Regency Hotel that will be attached to Stonebriar Centre. Plans for the Hyatt include a 3,000-square-foot space for the development of a city library. Holley said this project will come online in 2018.

Holley said it would take another bond election to construct another building, but the library is focused on expanding its current space.

“What the citizens told us is, ‘No, we don’t want a bunch of little buildings. We want a few large buildings because we don’t want to have to go to different libraries to get services,’” she said. “It’s almost the big-box model…they want the full width of services at any of the buildings they go to.”

Until more space can be built, Holley said the library space is being reallocated. The library administration is also considering moving more of its collection—especially its adult fiction collection—to an e-book format.

Holley said Frisco Public Library’s master plan differs from other cities because of Frisco’s growth.

“Most libraries, when they do their master plan, they cover a topic … they don’t do absolutely everything about their services,” she said. “Because Frisco is growing so quickly, our master plan covers every angle of what libraries do.”