Library Board named 2023 Trustees of Year at MLA Awards

The 2023 Great Falls Public Library Board of Trustees received the 2023 Jane Lopp Trustees of the Year award at the Montana Library Association annual banquet in Butte on Friday. 

The Board members honored were current board members chair Whitney Olson, Jessica Crist, Anne Bulger, Sam DeForest and former member Brad Eatherly. Eatherly left the board in the second half of 2023 and was replaced by Noelle Johnson for the remainder of his term. 

According to the MLA website, “The award is conferred upon a Montana public library trustee(s) in recognition of outstanding achievement and leadership. Nominations may be made by any library board, individual library, librarian, trustee, MLA member, or the Montana State Library Commission."
As stated in the letter of nomination written by GFPL Director Susie McIntyre:

Recent past winners of the Jane Lopp award include Al Logan from the ImaginIF Libraries, Jane Hamman from the North Jefferson Co. Library District and Rita Henkel from the Missoula Public Library. Lopp herself served on the Flathead County Library Board, now the ImagineIF Library Board, for many years. She was board chairwoman for two years before she died in 2017. 

The 2023 GFPL Board of Trustees are the first board members from Great Falls to win the award since 1984 when Jean Koppang took the honor.