Photo: “Over 2000+ tools available at our Tool Library” by Institute for a Resource-Based Economy (IRBE) is licensed under CC BY 2.0
By Daniel Mootz
The rise of intentional exchange economies highlights a growing interest in eradicating poverty and strengthening community, at the local level and in a global sense. For example, Community Supported Agriculture farms work to provide fresh produce to patrons on a regular basis, and non-profit organizations make knowledge and services available to the public without having to conform to market standards. Healthier, more helpful economies are being built around the imperatives of ecological sustainability and social healing, and people are choosing them over the wastefulness and frivolity of commercial retail. Olympia, and Thurston County, are well positioned to nurture class projects that supply, and enable access to an array of support systems otherwise left untapped.
Creating a just, and effective model for exchange has the potential to reshape community life. Offering enriching opportunities, and renewing relationships to wealth, equality, and infrastructure is itself a tool of organizing. What’s possible for any group, or town, to achieve is ultimately based on solidarity, interaction, and trust, rather than division, merit, or stipulation. Networks that directly empower unique endeavors also uplift society as a whole. In fact, inclusivity is the basic premise of the Carlisle Tool Library (CTL), a recent startup in Cumberland County, Pennsylvania—a place I know well. I grew up in Carlisle, and remain close friends with many of the people involved in the organization.
Located on Factory Street in North Carlisle, the CTL makes “tools, shop space, and expertise available to everyone,” according to their website, carlisletoollibrary.org. Nate Smith, a lifelong resident, co-founded the space with Jeff Adams in October of 2017. Nate had been renovating his house nearby, and was able to borrow a lot of what he needed from Jeff. The idea of a tool lending library was soon hatched, and in April, 2018, they officially opened their doors. I spoke with Nate recently about it, and he explained some of the nuts and bolts.
“The Carlisle Tool Library at its most basic gives the community access to tools which they may not be able to get otherwise,” he told me. “We have over 800 tools, many of which are expensive or tools that one might only use one time in their life. We also offer classes to teach skills that are often hard to come by in a society that decreasingly values building and repairing,” he said.
The town itself has a unique and storied heritage. It is where Jim Thorpe overcame “reeducation” and oppression at the Carlisle Indian Industrial School and became the greatest athlete of his time. It’s the halfway point on the Appalachian Trail, the nearest town some 15 miles from Pine Grove Furnace. And it’s the farthest north the confederate army ever got in America’s Civil War. Cannonball divots still mark the front of the old courthouse downtown, a reminder that the forces of injustice laid siege here before being repelled. Dickinson College, founded in 1783, still serves as the first school ever established in an independent America, and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. spoke here at the height of the Freedom Rides and lunch counter sit-ins in the early 1960s. Situated in the Cumberland Gap, the town of less than 20,000 is also the county seat, and is typically considered exurban, a sort of blend between farmlands and the capitol Harrisburg.
CTL’s “objective is to empower you to take mechanical problems into your own hands,” their website states. It is truly a self-help effort, with lots of cooperation and hands-on activity. The dedicated collective operates as “a distinct organization,” which “required incorporating, getting 501(c)(3) status, getting insurance, [and] forming a board of directors.” This required a ton of work, such as “fundraising, community outreach, tool acquisition, tool maintenance, inventory control, shop maintenance, program planning, partnership organization, and the list goes on,” Nate explained.
Jeff purchased the building with the help of some initial funding from “donations and small personal loans,” while Nate and others began acquiring donations of tools. The volunteer-run library works like any other library, Nate said. “You buy a membership and are then entitled to borrow up to eight tools per week.”
Furthermore, Nate told me that, at CTL, “All of the tools we loan have been donated, so we are able to extend the life of seldom-used tools to benefit the community writ large. Additionally, we have a workshop where members can bring in projects to work on with our bigger tools. Our yearly memberships are on a sliding scale based on income, and various community members have made donations earmarked for free memberships to those who can’t afford it.”
Nate recalled the many types of systems and frameworks he encountered while researching similar efforts. “The global tool library community is super helpful,” he said, which is exactly the kind of effect he, and the CTL, hope to have on their community, town, and region. At the same time, the “process of starting and running the tool library” has been a particularly positive experience for those involved. “We’ve had to come up with things like organizational systems and operating procedures, and retract and revise to work more efficiently and more to the benefit of our community,” Nate explained.
“I’m learning how to interact with all kinds of people from all kinds of different backgrounds. I have to learn how to ask people for money and prove to them our organization is doing good things. Overall it just continues to be a giant learning experience and is consistently pushing me out of my comfort zone,” he said.
The library hosts regular events and invites the public to participate, and collaborate with different aspects of the shop. “We have fix-it fairs throughout the year,” Nate described, “where people bring broken items and volunteers help repair the items alongside them. This not only prevents waste and saves money, but it teaches folks how to fix things and empowers them to think critically about repairing and what it means on a larger scale.” More information on upcoming workshops and offerings can be found on CTL’s Facebook page.
Here in Olympia there is a demonstrable need to reclaim, and repurpose space for the common good. Tool libraries, and other outlets for solidifying creative exchange, are in clear demand, and should be supported by the public, as well as the educated professionals who work for both the college and the state. The bike shop on campus exemplifies how DIY solidarity is sustainable, and how it serves a positive social function. Buildings like the Procession of the Species art studios, including the one for lease on the corner of 4th Avenue and Water Street, invite new perspectives for meeting the needs of a diverse scale of community projects.
