Oak Park Library

So grateful for this library. It’s beautiful architecture and tranquility makes me want to come here with my little boy every weekend to read. Staff is lovely and friendly.

I was actually shushed! I’m a children’s librarian myself, and I was amazed, especially as we were just talking in normal voices. The librarian was friendly and helpful, but the clerk was just nasty.

The selection of books is small, so you won’t find many things you’re looking for. If not, just go to the TO library like ten miles away. It’s huge and has an enormous selection of books, CDs, and international books.
The library always has kids in it during weekdays, making the whole thing really noisy and distracting. The librarians do buddy-​buddy with some of the kids, and continuously call out to them. Basically, on weekdays, it’s really more of an after school daycare instead of a library.
There are computers and a printer accessible– printing, I think, is $.10 a page. They also sell a selection of books for a dollar, so I always sneak in and look if there’s anything new.
More than often, in the hallway, they will put out a free stash of encyclopedias– take them! It’s a decent deal!

Agree with some of the previous reviews — this library is more of the Oak Park Unified School District Library than the Oak Park Library.
A lot of parents in the middle school and the high school treat it like a free day care. After school, kids descend upon the location, hog up all the computers, and generally make a loud mess until they are picked up by the parents, sometimes as late as 8pm. Not a quiet library at all — even the staff are loud. The librarians try to handle the situation, but you can tell they lose their patience sometimes when the kids get really rowdy — I’ve heard some of them yelling at a few particularly bad eggs occasionally.
Book selection is pretty limited and outdated. I was surprised when the took out the young adults reading room in the back and replaced it with a weird chalky-​walled study room. Definitely a sign that this is more of an extension of the high school than a public library.
The parking is very limited and moves very slow when it’s time for the parents to pick their kids up. Very quiet and almost empty on the weekends.

The library is ridiculous. There is no where to park, the hours are somewhere between barely open and not open at all. It really isn’t for the community. It is for the high school. When the students are there they are noisy, often hollering and the librarians holler back at them. The selection is old and not at all for the intelligent. The librarian dresses scantily. It is not worth it. They are very slow and life is not that long.

The Oak Park library is a shared library with Oak Park High School (located next door). It’s on the smaller size, so the selection of books at your immediate disposal is not great. However, the library is part of the Ventura County system of libraries, so you can go online and pick out the book (s) you want, have them sent over to OPL and them drop by and pick them up.
The librarians are very helpful (especially Janice and Bea — they’re super nice ladies), and there are plenty of computers for either surfing the ‘Net or looking up items in VC’s system-​wide card catalog.
The library is relatively new, so it’s clean and comfortable. Parking can be an issue on the evenings when the meeting room is used.

I go to libraries when I’m totally broke and need to feel productive, nonetheless. Like right now.
So, this time, I’m sitting in the lovely little Oak Park Library in Ventura County because I have a psychiatrist appointment way over here and I’ve got two hours to kill and no money.
It’s very quiet here. And there are only about two people here, so there are plenty of open tables with nearby plugs for my computer — must take advantage of the free wireless I’m getting with my shiny new (and free) Ventura County Library card. However, the connection is very, very slow.
I took my ADHD meds and its nicely air-​conditioned, so I don’t mind waiting so much. Especially since the cast of characters is so interesting — an asian woman is picking her butt as she crouches on the floor between the stacks and devours a muffler-​repair book. And a pre-​bipolar girl, sporting Teva sandals with white tube socks hiked nearly to her knees, is angrily coloring outside the lines and onto the table.
There’s also a cool (and somewhat bizarre) neon «lounge» area for kids, with plastic, neon bar chairs and beanbags — and it kind of reminds me of the Google offices — more geeky and «contemporary» than cool or comfortable. Also, don’t come here expecting to find a recent bestseller; there are probably more self-​service computers here than library books.