Prison project for former bookseller

Patricia Morrison (pictured: see link below) volunteered to help out half a day a week at Arohata Women’s Prison Library in 2002. Her book knowledge soon became apparent and she was invited to help set up a library at Rimutaka Prison which then had 500 inmates, but no library facility. Since then she has been a library volunteer working half a day a week at either Rimutaka or Mount Crawford, more correctly known as Wellington Prison. Morrison doesn’t have a title: “I’m just known as the neat lady who gets books.” Eight years later, this involvement with prison library services sees her undertaking two projects – first a relatively major spend on new books to increase the size of prison and correctional facilities libraries throughout the country, and second a review of all those 20 libraries, from Ngawha in Northland to the southernmost in Invercargill, including the three prisons for women. For full report dated 20 May 2010 see: http://www.booksellers.co.nz/book-news/trade-news/prison-project-former-bookseller