The Ottawa Public Library (OPL) is receiving a major gift amounting to $750,000 to support the new central library and joint facility with Library and Archives Canada (LAC), Ādisōke.
The gift is from the Friends of the Ottawa Public Library Association (FOPLA), the group said in a news release on Thursday.
“We are proud to be commemorating more than 20 years of friendship with OPL and contributing to the development of this important community space in the capital,” said Kathleen O’Connell Renaud, president and CEO of FOPLA in the release.
The money will be used to fund, in part, the restoration and installation in Ādisōke of several OPL public art pieces, such as the stained-glass window from OPL’s main branch on Metcalfe Street, which honours literature, writers and readers, serving as the “only remaining piece of the original Carnegie-funded library that opened in Ottawa in 1906,” FOPLA says.
The $750,000 was raised entirely from used book sales by volunteers, donors and members, FOPLA adds.
FOPLA has donated more than $4,500,000 to OPL since it was created in 2003.