Evanston Public Library’s Board of Trustees named Yolande Wilburn, head of the public library system in Santa Cruz, California, as its new executive director on Thursday evening. EPL has been searching for a new executive director since July 2022.

After three rounds of interviews, Wilburn was selected from more than 160 applicants. As executive director, she will be responsible for creating and implementing an EPL strategic plan, hiring and managing a senior leadership team, connecting with the Evanston community and building relationships with residents on transparency and trust.

While the list of responsibilities is not short, Wilburn said in the EPL release that she is looking forward to “expanding collaborations with the city, country and nonprofits in the community” and “understanding Evanston’s needs and how (the library) can best meet them.”

Wilburn was born and raised in Chicago and has lived on Evanston’s south side. Early in her career as a librarian, Wilburn developed the Innovations Lab at Chicago’s Harold Washington Library, winning the Social Innovator Award, an award for innovation in the Chicago area.

She then moved to California, where she worked as a librarian in Torrance. She worked as a county librarian in Nevada County and as a library manager for the County of Los Angeles Public Libraries, before taking the helm of Santa Cruz’s libraries in 2021.

“Her record of strategic planning, budgetary management, and staff development is exactly what is needed to support the extraordinary work our staff do on a daily basis,”  EPL Board President Tracy Fulce said in the release.

Wilburn will start her duties on Nov. 13, according to the release.

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