The LA County Library is the 2019 Gale/LJ Library of the Year. That accolade is story enough, but this year the news is enhanced by another breakthrough. With this win, LA County Library becomes the only library to win the Gale/LJ Library of the Year award in the same year that its director was named LJ’s Librarian of the Year—that’s Skye Patrick. And, in late 2018, LA County Library had developed such dynamic, skillful ways to tell its story that its marketing team won the LJ Marketer of the Year Award.

This impressive hat trick was set in motion in 2016 when Patrick took the helm as director, bringing a vision that has since transformed the library system. That ideal focuses every LA County library and service on equity of access and education for every person in the 3,000 square mile area served by the system, no matter their age, gender, ethnicity, origin, sexual orientation, socioeconomic or legal status, nationality, or physical ability and has spurred robust innovation, organizational change, and broad implementation of new approaches across the library system.