In 16 years as Yates library director, Cebula expanded programs, connections with readers

Photo by Tom Rivers: Emily Cebula is shown last week at Yates Community Library, where she was director the director the past 16 years. She is retiring. There will be a reception in her honor on Jan. 21 from 4 to 6 p.m. at the library.

LYNDONVILLE – Emily Cebula started a new chapter in her life in 2008 when she was hired as director of the Yates Community Library.

Cebula, a Bergen native, had recently moved to Lyndonville. She liked the small town atmosphere and felt providence with the position opening up.

“It was a God-given thing to have this job and a home,” Cebula said.

She was eager to commit long-term to a community. Her late husband Jacob Cebula was in the U.S. Forest Service and worked in more than a dozen states. He was 51 when he passed away 21 years ago.

Emily and Jacob both grew up in Bergen. Their goal was to return and close to their hometown.

“We both loved this area beyond anything else,” Cebula said. “It was our dream to come back to this area.”

After earning her master’s in library science from Geneseo State College, Emily started her career 40 years ago when she was hired as the first director of the Gillam Grant Community Center Library in Bergen. She set up the library with its first 10,000 books.

During her husband’s career, Cebula would work at a library in Missouri and as a teacher’s assistant in North Carolina. The job at Yates Community Library was a chance to lead a library again.

“She has been wonderful,” said Ginny Hughes, a board member for the library. “She really embraced the community when she moved here. She is a valuable person in the community.”

File photo: Emily Cebula, director of Yates Community Library, reads a story to first-graders after they saw a story walk in October 2019.

Cebula is the lone full-time employee at the library with four part-timers. The library has an annual circulation of about 12,000 books and other items.

Hughes often drives by the library and Cebula’s car is parked there early and late.

“She is a very sweet person who has the library and reading in her heart,” Hughes said. “She has tried to help every reader.”

Cebula organizes many of the library programs, an outdoor concert series, book club and other projects.

“The more programs we have, the more ways we can get people in the library,” Hughes said.

Cebula is retiring. There will be a reception at the library in her honor from 4 to 6 p.m. on Jan. 21.

Yates Community Library has hired Chrissy Carney as the new director. Carney worked for the Nioga Library System helping the member libraries develop and run programs, especially the smaller libraries in the three-county system. She worked as an assistant for Nioga with youth services.

“She knows the Nioga administrators and member libraries’ staff,” Cebula said.

Serving as director of a library is like running a small business, Cebula said, managing employees, planning programs, meeting customer needs and operating on a lean budget.

“We do everything the bigger libraries do but we do it with a smaller staff and less money,” Cebula said.