r/FranklinCountyMA

Originally published in the June 18, 2026 edition of The Montague Reporter:

Libraries are meant to be for everyone. No matter your beliefs, your race, your gender, or your access to wealth and education. If any public institution should embody belonging, it should be the library.

Yet, as an employee, I am already asking myself questions each day before the Carnegie Library even opens: Do I need to park in the only disabled parking space we have today, or do I leave it for a patron? How many trips up and down the basement stairs to my desk can I manage today? Do I need to reserve one of the four computers for our patrons so I can work without excruciating pain? Can I comfortably use the bathrooms, or will I need to drive home just to pee? If I do, will I still have enough energy to return? 

In other words, before the day even begins, I have to ask myself how to ration access.

While my experience is personal, these questions aren’t. Every inaccessible public building sends a message about who belongs. Today, the Carnegie Library often sends the message that access is something some people have to earn, rather than expect, from the institutions meant to serve them.

A few years ago, I might have described needing to go up and down the stairs multiple times in a shift as an inconvenience, not an agony. I certainly wouldn’t have thought I’d need to drive to my home in Greenfield just to use the bathroom. (And I shudder to imagine having to schedule my bathroom time around the 35-minute bus ride to my home from the library.) 

The consequences are bigger than a staircase, a parking space, or a bathroom. In Montague, roughly 16.4% of residents under the age of 65 live with disabilities affecting their hearing, vision, cognition, or mobility. These are not abstract numbers. They are our neighbors, coworkers, family members, and friends. Real people who deserve to be included in the design of our public spaces.

When we talk about accessibility, we’re really talking about who gets to participate in community life: Who gets to work here? Who gets to attend a program, join a committee, serve on a board, or spend a career in public service? Public buildings shape the answers to those questions. They communicate who was considered during planning, and who was expected to adapt or endure in silence.

As someone who loves this community and wants to continue serving it for many years to come, these questions feel deeply personal. Accessibility determines not only who can enter a space, but who can imagine a future there. When I can’t get down the stairs to my desk in the Carnegie Library, when I have to choose between my access or your neighbor’s just to park, it’s hard for me to see that future.

A new library is an opportunity to determine what kind of community we want this to be. I want it to be one where we take care of each other and invest in each other’s well-being. As Montague imagines its next chapter, I hope we choose a story that leaves no one wondering whether they belong. 

Lachlan Thompson is an employee of the Montague Public Libraries. The views expressed in this op/ed are their own.