By Brian Gilliland

REHOBOTH BEACH — With some staff changes finalized, including promoting Lauren McCauley to director from interim after almost a year, the questions facing the Rehoboth Beach Public Library are now ones of location and operations.

On Friday, Ms. McCauley said nothing had been decided in the ongoing negotiations between the library board and the city, but general plans to maintain a presence downtown while constructing another site near Del. 24 and Warrington Road are proceeding.

The decision to add another location stems from a 2019 program study, she said, in which the top complaints about the Rehoboth Avenue building were parking and traffic.

Ms. McCauley — who came aboard as the library’s events coordinator in 2018 — said that, based on the study’s feedback, the facility’s board started scouting for another location.

The Rehoboth Beach Public Library is an independent site, part of a statewide consortium that, since 1975, has had contracts with the state and Sussex County to provide funding. The city, donors and grants make up most of the rest, according to the library’s annual report.

Each library, be it run by a board, like Rehoboth Beach’s, or by a county, like in Lewes, has a jurisdiction. And so, another branch of the Rehoboth Beach venue would have to be built in a certain area, Ms. McCauley explained.

After two years as events coordinator, Ms. McCauley was promoted to program librarian. Since July 2023, she had been serving as interim director, until she was named director by a unanimous vote of the board in March.

The library has also named a new events coordinator, Jay Campbell, and promoted Julie Pusey to adult services librarian.

“We’re really looking forward to our summer program, called ‘Adventure Begins in Your Library,’ and we have lots of events planned for that,” Ms. McCauley said. “I’m excited to do what I love in a place I love.”