Whitefish Community Library employees have agreed to donate about 75 books to a statewide effort to send books to Myanmar, where residents continue to rebuild after a devastating cyclone hit in 2008.

The Whitefish commitment puts it at the top of the list of Montana libraries donating books to the effort, Whitefish Community Library Board Secretary Allison Pomerantz said.

Other libraries that have agreed to donate books include 22 from the Parmly Billings Library, 35 from the Montana State University-Billings library, 20 from the Butte-Silverbow Library and six from the Rocky Mountain Laboratories Library in Hamilton. Libraries in Missoula, Helena and Great Falls have agreed to donate as well.

The book donation effort is spearheaded by the Nargis Library Recovery and the NLR Interest Group of the Montana Library Association. The organizations have a goal of distributing 600,000 books to 250 libraries in Myanmar by the end of the year, with a goal of 1 million books by the end of 2013.

People may donate new or clean, used books to the Myanmar effort, Whitefish Library Director Joey Kositzky said. Donated books can include recent encyclopedias, dictionaries, textbooks and news magazines, she said.

Donations must be dropped off at the Whitefish library by July 9.

“It’s really worth the effort when you stop to consider the difference that the right book, or access to even a small library collection, can make in anyone’s life at a key time,” Whitefish library board Vice Chairwoman Anne Shaw Moran said of the Myanmar project. “This just goes to show that it doesn’t matter where you are in the world, the word ‘library’ always spells ‘community’ and we are thrilled to help them rebuild and restock.”

The May 2, 2008, cyclone killed 140,000 people.

Reporter Shelley Ridenour may be reached at 758-4439 or sridenour@dailyinterlake.com.