Gulf Coast Diabetes Foundation donates to Selby Library More than 20 million Americans have diabetes. More than 6 million have the disease and don’t even know it. The Gulf Coast Diabetes Foundation wants to make Sarasota County residents more aware of the disease and measures for prevention and treatment through a donation to the Selby Public Library. The foundation has provided funding to the Selby Public Library to purchase books and DVDs on diabetes. The foundation also plans to make an annual gift to the Sarasota County Library System for materials that will provide the most current educational resources for diabetes. The mission of the Gulf Coast Diabetes Foundation is to establish sources of funds and administer these funds to benefit people with diabetes in the Florida Gulf Coast Region. Grants are provided to healthcare providers, organizations and community-based programs for supplies, services, education and research for the care of diabetes and its directly related complications. For more information, contact the Sarasota County Call Center at 941-861-5000 and ask about the donated materials from the Gulf Coast Diabetes Foundation at Selby Public Library.   Read Around the Whole Wide World at Your Library It's not too early for children and parents to start thinking about participating in the 2008 Summer Reading Program at the library. The overall theme for this summer is "Whole Wide World at Your Library" since everyone can find a world of information at the library. The Youth Services Departments of Jacaranda Library, Selby Library and Venice Library have published summer program calendars. Find them on the library's website: Jacaranda (PDF), Selby and Venice. Also, find the calendars on flickr: Contact the Youth Services Department of these libraries for more information on their summer programs: -Elsie Quirk Library -Fruitville Library -Gulf Gate Library -North Port Library -North Sarasota Library   Libraries and Sarasota Reds team up to promote reading Sarasota County libraries and the Sarasota Reds are teaming up to promote reading. Beginning on opening day, April 5, children who check out any four books at any of the eight Sarasota County public libraries will receive a Home Run Reading Card. Upon reading the books and returning them to the library, a library staff member will initial their reading card, which is good for a general admission ticket to any 2008 Sarasota Reds game at Ed Smith Stadium. “The program was a huge success last year with kids from all eight Sarasota County libraries taking part,” said North Sarasota Library’s Hal Harmon. In addition to getting free admission to a 2008 game, children will also have a chance to win a 2009 Sarasota Reds general admission season ticket by reading more books. "We created the Big League Reader Program here in Sarasota because we felt it was very important to show the necessity and importance for children to read and to make it an enjoyable experience at the same time," said General Manager Dan Wolfert. "We are happy to provide kids with an incentive to read and we look forward to this partnership for years to come." Find out more on KidZone: http://www.sclibs.net/Kids/big_league_reader.aspx For more information, contact the Sarasota County Call Center at 941-861-5000 and ask about the Big League Reader program.