The head of Denver Arts & Venue for nearly two decades, White Brunetti has led the Aurora Library and Cultural Services Department since February 2024. In her new position, she manages more than ninety full-time staffers, a small portfolio of cultural buildings and the Aurora library system. She's also working with "a robust portfolio of cultural facilities," White Brunetti says, including the Aurora Fox Arts Center, the People's Building and the Aurora History Museum, as well as ongoing programs like Art in Public Places.
Over the past eighteen months, White Brunetti has overseen the creation of the Aurora Borealis Festival, the fortieth anniversary celebration of the Aurora Fox Theater, the return of First Friday celebrations on Colfax Avenue, and the installation of unique sculptures in the Aurora Highlands.
While she nurtures Aurora's growing art scene, she also oversees the relatively tiny library system that serves a population of 400,000 in Colorado's third-largest city. "We're not a very well-funded library system, so we have to do a lot with a little," says White Brunetti. "We have a ways to go as a municipal library district to try to fund our branches and our system in a way that meets the needs of our community."
Aurora has seven library branches and an $8 million annual operating budget for its libraries, placing it 104th out of 107 state library systems in terms of annual funding per capita. By contrast, Denver boasts more than two dozen library branches and a $90 million budget; Nicolle Davies, Denver's new city librarian and executive director of its public library system, is slated to begin work mid-August.
According to the City of Aurora, the population has grown "dramatically" by 300,000 people during the last fifty years. In another fifty years, the city projects that it will reach a population of 700,000, which is about the current population of the City of Denver.
In February, White Brunetti started working on a strategic plan for Aurora's libraries that will guide decision-making over the next few years. The process began by collecting feedback from Aurora residents with about 2,400 surveys and at several community events; she's now drafting a vision for the future of the city's libraries.
"As we're going through this strategic planning process, we're identifying gaps in services, especially in those growth areas," White Brunetti says."It's not surprise that the Aurora Highlands and some of those eastern neighborhoods south of the airport are where there's an opportunity for expansion, and I think that's something that might be identified in this strategic plan. How we might do that as a city remains to be seen."
The city's flagship branch, Aurora Central Library at 14949 East Alameda Parkway, has the highest volume of visits and checkouts; it also has popular programs for adults, teens and kids, including English, financial literacy and computer classes. The city has $3 million in federal funding delegated for improving Aurora Central Library; those funds will likely go towards improvements in the building and programming, according to White Brunetti,
The Martin Luther King Jr. Library, at 9898 East Colfax Avenue, is currently undergoing a $2.5 million renovation that's expected to finish in the fall. White Brunetti says the library will also be "beefing up" its programs and classes for teens. The MLK Jr. branch is within the boundaries of Aurora's proposed Downtown Development Authority, which would raise money with bonds to fund investments in revitalizing the area. White Brunetti oversees several facilities in the proposed boundaries, including the Aurora Fox Arts Center.
In February, White Brunetti started working on a strategic plan for Aurora's libraries that will guide decision-making over the next few years. The process began by collecting feedback from Aurora residents with about 2,400 surveys and at several community events; she's now drafting a vision for the future of the city's libraries.
"As we're going through this strategic planning process, we're identifying gaps in services, especially in those growth areas," White Brunetti says."It's not surprise that the Aurora Highlands and some of those eastern neighborhoods south of the airport are where there's an opportunity for expansion, and I think that's something that might be identified in this strategic plan. How we might do that as a city remains to be seen."
Big and Small, Aurora Libraries Try to Offer What Their Neighborhoods Need
Last year, patrons of the Aurora Library branches checked out books or used other library services 3.4 million times over more than half a million visits to the seven branches, including three major facilities — the Martin Luther King Jr., Aurora Central and Mission Viejo libraries — and four small libraries.The city's flagship branch, Aurora Central Library at 14949 East Alameda Parkway, has the highest volume of visits and checkouts; it also has popular programs for adults, teens and kids, including English, financial literacy and computer classes. The city has $3 million in federal funding delegated for improving Aurora Central Library; those funds will likely go towards improvements in the building and programming, according to White Brunetti,
The Tallyn's Reach branch, at 23911 East Arapahoe Road, is the only branch on the far side of E-470, where Aurora is growing fast. The library building won't see an expansion anytime soon, White Brunetti says, but because it's far from the metro core and embedded in a residential area to the east, the city could invest in expanding its programs for families and kids.
"At Tallyn's Reach, there are a lot of families that really love our story time, love our teen program," White Brunetti says. "So how do we invest more in programming there, as in other parts of the city we invest in computers or WiFi hotspots? We try to have a baseline approach across the system, but then also make strategic investments in the community's needs."
The Hoffman Heights Library, at 1298 Peoria Street, only has two rooms. But even though it's small, it serves as a community hub for the Del Mar neighborhood around it and has seen a good turnout for the farmers' market it recently started hosting. "That's something we're really thinking about across all our branches: How do we turn these into community hubs as much as they are libraries?" she says. "One of the ways we're testing that is with this farmers' market."
The Chambers Plaza Library, at 1551 Chambers Road, is "sort of like one large room," according White Brunetti. Since it opened in January 2023, the library "is still trying to find its population that really wants to seek library services," she adds.
The Illiff Square Library, 2253 South Peoria Street, is a tiny, one-room branch tucked in a strip mall near Overland High School. Teenagers frequent the library, and White Brunetti says that "a lot of people use the computers" for tasks like applying for jobs and writing resumes.
Aurora is investing $75,000 in renovations at the Mission Viejo Library, at 15324 East Hampden Circle, which is celebrating its fiftieth anniversary. A "150 for 50" campaign launches on August 16 with the goal of raising $75,000 to match the city's investment. The library recorded more than 77,000 visits, 57,000 items checked out and 29,000 computer sessions in 2024, according to the city.
"That is a very well-loved, highly utilized neighborhood branch," White Brunetti says. "People walk their kids to it, we have a lot of great community celebrations that happen there, and I think it's part of what makes that neighborhood special."
While Aurora would like to add branch libraries in other neighborhoods, "I can't even begin to tackle what the timeline is for that," White Brunetti says, adding that the strategic planning process may provide more of an idea.
In her role overseeing libraries and cultural facilities, White Brunetti sees an opportunity to mold Aurora's identity as it grows. The Mile High City already has a national image thanks to icons like Red Rocks and the big blue bear at the Denver Convention Center, facilities she used to manage. But Aurora doesn't have anything like that, so White Brunetti is part of the internal discussion of what Aurora can be, especially as it gets over last year's Venezuelan gang controversy, which Aurora Mayor Mike Coffman called a "national embarrassment" in January.
"That's what's exciting about Aurora. There's still opportunity to help define that and be part of building and creating what that identity can be and amplifying what it is," White Brunetti says. "It feels a little more like there's a frontier here that's still being discovered and developed."
