Addie Finley

Addie Finley has given more than forty years of volunteer service to Billerica's library, recreation and arts boards. She was elected to the Board of Trustees of the Billerica Public Library in 1981, joining a board chaired by Wilfrid Lahaie, and served on it until 1993. In those years she guided the Junior Friends of the Library, a group of young people formed in 1982 who raised money for the Children's Room with carnivals, flea markets, book sales and "Make Your Own Sundae" nights. The trustees' report for 1983 congratulated "Mrs. Addie Finley, who guides this group," and noted that she had been nominated for Trustee of the Year by the Massachusetts Library Trustee Association.

She was chairperson of the trustees in 1984 and 1985 and signed their reports for both years. In 1984 the Junior Friends received a letter of congratulation from President Reagan and were honored with proclamations from Governor Dukakis and the selectmen declaring a Junior Friend Week, while the trustees prepared a handbook for library employees, installed a theft detection system and began entering the book collection into a computer. Her report for 1985 recorded that the library had gone on line in November, giving patrons access to the books of the Merrimack Valley Library Consortium, and that an LSCA grant had opened a special needs resource center in the Children's Room. She later served the board as its treasurer, and in 2023 she was again listed among the library trustees.

From 1987 to 1989 she was a member of the Billerica Arts Council, and in 1989 she was appointed to the Recreation Commission, on which she served for three decades. In 1990 to 1993 she was one of its co-liaison officers, in the years when the commission reported the building of the Kids' Konnection playground at Pollard park, raised by a citizens' group in a little over two years, and a local Hershey track meet that was the largest in the country, and from 2016 to 2019 she was its secretary. She returned to the Arts Council in 2013 as its chairperson; her report for that year describes grants to the library, the schools, local artists and town-wide events such as the Fourth of July celebration and the Billerica Family New Year Celebration, and a partnership with BATV in which middle school students filmed the council's events for cable television.

References

1. Billerica Town Report 1981, town officers: Billerica Public Library Board of Trustees, Addie Finley, term to 6/30/84
2. Billerica Town Report 1983, Library Trustees report: Mrs. Addie Finley guides the Junior Friends; nominated for Trustee of the Year by the Massachusetts Library Trustee Association
3. Billerica Town Report 1984, Library Trustees report signed by Addie Finley, Chairperson (Junior Friends honored, employee handbook, computer)
4. Billerica Town Report 1985, Library Trustees report signed by Addie Finley, Chairperson (library on line with the Merrimack Valley Library Consortium, November 1985)
5. Billerica Town Report 1989, appointed officers: Arts Council, Addie Finley, resigned 9/89
6. Billerica Town Report 1990, Recreation Commission report signed by Addie Finley, Co-Liaison Officer (Kids' Konnection playground)
7. Billerica Town Report 2013, Billerica Arts Council report signed by Addie Finley, Chairperson
8. Billerica Town Report 2016, appointed officers: Recreation Commission, Addie Finley, Secretary