Free Repairs Shop Available at Westborough Public Library

From Westborough Public Library: At the Westborough Public Library, located at 55 West Main St., on Saturday, April 8, 2017, everything centers on making repairs. Starting at 9 a.m. and ending at 12 p.m., knowledgeable volunteer repair experts will be available to help make all possible repairs free of charge. Small appliances, vacuum cleaners, lamps, computers (please bring power cords), jewelry, clothing, bikes, toys, and anything that is broken is welcome and can most likely be repaired. Knives & garden tools can also be sharpened.

Volunteers will look at the items brought in and try to repair them for free – you may be asked to pay for needed parts if they can be obtained on the day of the event. If you know what parts are needed, please get them ahead of time and bring them to the Repair Café to save time. Unlike a “fix-it” shop where people drop off items to be repaired, people are asked to stay while their items are being fixed. You can just watch, help with the repair, fix the item yourself with help from the volunteers, or just have a snack and visit with neighbors. If the volunteers cannot repair something, they will offer suggestions about where you could go for repairs.

By promoting repairs, the Westborough Library and Westborough Rotary want to help reduce mountains of waste. We throw away piles of stuff even things which practically have nothing wrong with them, and which could easily be used again after a simple repair. Unfortunately, many people have forgotten that they can have things repaired. Repair Café wants to change all that.

Repair Café is also meant to put neighbors in touch with each other in a new way, save money, and discover that a lot of know-how and practical skills can be found close to home. If you repair a bike, a CD player, or a pair of trousers together with a previously unfamiliar neighbor, you look at that person in a different light the next time you run into them on the street. Jointly making repairs can lead to connections in the community. But above all, Repair Café just wants to show how much fun repairing things can be, and how easy it often is.

The Repair Café concept arose in the Netherlands in 2010. The Repair Cafe foundation provides support to local groups around the world wishing to start their own Repair Café. The Repair Café aims to reintroduce the art of repairing back into the community and to spread repair knowledge and skills. For more information about Repair Café go to www.repaircafe.org.

The Westborough Library and Rotary Club of Westborough will have a Repair Café on a regular basis (approximately twice a year) at the Westborough Library. For more information or to volunteer, send an email to repaircafe@westboroughrotary.org or call Donna Martel, Adult Services Librarian, at 508-366-3050 or Gerry Gross, Rotary Club of Westborough at 508-735-6141.

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