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Applications Now Open For BiblioTech Library Cards

Bexar County residents can now apply for their own BiblioTech library card, as the country’s first bookless all-digital public library gets ready to open its doors less than a month from now.

When it opens, the library will have 10,000 titles available for download from the publisher 3M.

"If  you have an Android or an Apple device you would simply download the 3M Cloud Library app and put in your library card information and you will have instant access," said BiblioTech Branch Manager Catarina Velasquez.

For those that do not have their own digital device, the library will have 500 e-readers to loan out, which is up from the 100 it originally planned. The county has spent about $2 million to build the library and purchase titles.

Bexar County Judge Nelson Wolff said the area around the new library faces a lack of digital resources.

"We’re starting in the Southside of San Antonio in an area that you would say is [the] wrong side of the digital divide," Wolff said. "About half the households in San Antonio do not have an internet connection -- probably 75-80 percent don’t where we’re going."

Wolff said that if this branch is successful, another one will likely be set up next year on the West Side.

Joey Palacios can be reached atJoey@TPR.org and on Twitter at @Joeycules