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Mount Pleasant Collegiate Institute Historic DistrictMount Pleasant Collegiate Institute Historic District · Photo: Jerrye & Roy Klotz, MD · CC BY-SA 3.0
Mt. Pleasant Branch Library · part of Cabarrus County Public Library

Mount Pleasant’s library is a branch of Cabarrus County Public Library, which lends more per resident than 53% of systems its size

Mount Pleasant’s library is the Mt. Pleasant Branch Library, a branch of Cabarrus County Public Library, which serves 242,880 people and lent 1M items last year.

8556 Cook St., Mt. Pleasant 28124 · about 54 hours a week
B+Civic lifeAhead of 67% of U.S. towns. Nonprofits and volunteering.
Borrowed a year
1M
4.2 per resident
Visits a year
325K
1.3 per resident · Below typical (2.1)
Programs & events
2,558
about 49 a week · 55K attended
Cardholders
28%
68,127 cards
Open
54 hrs
a week at this branch

What stands out about Mt. Pleasant Branch Library

Read from the library’s own yearly report. The page puts what stands out first.

Civic life grade

What’s behind Mount Pleasant’s civic life grade

On community nonprofits and volunteering, Mount Pleasant is ahead of 67% of U.S. towns. Mount Pleasant is graded on two of the three inputs. The share of younger adults in volunteering groups holds the grade up; Mount Pleasant’s count of community nonprofits pulls it down.

B+
Civic lifeA character grade: shown, never part of Mount Pleasant’s overall grade.
All U.S. towns we grade (17,556)Ahead of 67%
FewerMore
U.S. towns with similar incomes, $68K–$113K (8,282)Ahead of 68%

Civic life counts registered nonprofits, library visits and online volunteering groups, so it can miss civic life that runs through congregations, mutual aid or neighbors looking out for each other.

How sure. Graded on two inputs, so a change in either one moves the letter more than it would with three. Mount Pleasant is small (1,816 residents), so a few dozen organizations or visits move its per-resident figures; the volunteering share is a 2022 estimate from Facebook users aged 25–44.

Library visits: IMLS Public Libraries Survey, FY2024. Nonprofits: IRS Exempt Organizations Business Master File, October 2026. Volunteering: Social Capital Atlas (Opportunity Insights), from data by Meta Platforms, Inc.; Chetty et al., Nature 2022. How TownRatings grades civic life →

Places to belong

7 community nonprofits are registered in Mount Pleasant

3.2 per 1,000 residents, against a U.S. town median of 3.7. The largest group: human services.

Community nonprofits, by kind

Arts & culture10.31 per 1,000 · U.S. towns 0.24
Youth, sports & recreation10.31 per 1,000 · U.S. towns 0.52
Civic groups, clubs & veterans10.31 per 1,000 · U.S. towns 0.74
Human services10.63 per 1,000 · U.S. towns 0.59
Education10.63 per 1,000 · U.S. towns 0.43
Health10.31 per 1,000 · U.S. towns 0.16
Environment & animals00.22 per 1,000 · U.S. towns 0.17
Other10.45 per 1,000 · U.S. towns 0.47

Counted from the IRS list of tax-exempt organizations by mailing address (fractions where a ZIP code spans towns). Congregations are counted apart (2 here), since whether a church registers depends on its denomination, not the town.

Volunteering

10.7%

10.7% of Mount Pleasant’s Facebook users aged 25–44 belong to a volunteering or activism group, against 5.2% in the typical North Carolina town and 7.5% nationally.

Volunteering: Social Capital Atlas (Opportunity Insights), from data by Meta Platforms, Inc.; Chetty et al., Nature 2022. ZIP-code figures, weighted by where Mount Pleasant’s residents live; 2022.

How it compares

Ahead of most similar-size libraries on 4 of 8 measures

Per resident, against libraries serving 100,000+ people across the U.S.

Visits per resident 1.3 visits · typical 2.1Lower than 80%
Borrowing per resident 3.3 print items · typical 3.2Higher than 53%
Digital borrowing 0.9 e-items · typical 1.4Lower than 64%
Kids’ borrowing 2.3 kids’ items · typical 1.6Higher than 66%
Program attendance 0.2 attendees · typical 0.2Higher than 56%
Programs offered 10.5 per 1,000 residents · typical 9Higher than 55%
Cardholders 28% of residents · typical 41%Lower than 76%
Spending $21 per resident · typical $36Lower than 77%
Fewer per residentMore per resident
Size group

Cabarrus County Public Library serves 242,880 people, so it’s measured against U.S. libraries serving 100,000+.

A year at the library

Every hour the doors are open, about 68 items go out

Fiscal year 2024, for the whole Cabarrus County Public Library system. The library’s own count.

325K
visits
1.3 per resident
1M
loans, print + digital
4.2 per resident
2,558
programs & events
55K attended
68K
library cards
28% of people served
Every open hour68items borrowed
Every week1,066people at a program
Every week6,250visits
62 staff (full-time equivalent)61 public computers
What people borrow

More than half the print loans are kids’ books

1M loans last year: print, kids’ and digital.

1Mloans
Books & media (adults) 23%Kids’ books & media 55%E-books, audio & streaming 22%
From your couch

224,326 e-books, e-audiobooks and streams last year. Borrow from home with your card, plus research databases: courses, journals, genealogy and more.

Kids & programs

About 28 kids’ programs a week

Story times, clubs, classes and events, across the whole system, by who they’re for.

Schools in Mount Pleasant →

Programs last year by age group

Ages 0–51,117
Ages 6–11317
Teens193
Adults482
All ages449
Little ones
21.5

story times and programs a week for ages 0–5, on average.

568K
kids’ books & media borrowed
55K
people at programs
2,558
programs
The building

Find it

Mt. Pleasant Branch Library, 8556 Cook St., Mt. Pleasant.

54
hours open a week
3,780
square feet
With a card

No late fees. E-books and audiobooks from home. Loans renew on their own if no one’s waiting. Research databases: courses, journals, genealogy. Good at every Cabarrus County Public Library branch.

New in Mount Pleasant? The Handbook →

Hours are the survey’s yearly average. Check the library’s own site for today’s hours.

What your card is worth

For every $1 it spends, the library lends about $2.88 worth

Set what you’d borrow in a month. It starts at what the average Mount Pleasant cardholder borrows.

In a month I’d use…
Books$17 each
1
Kids’ books$12 each
1
E-books & audio$15 each
0
Movies & music$4 each
0
Programs & classes$10 a program
0
Computer & Wi-Fi$3 a session
0
Your card saves you about
$348
a year at retail prices · $29 a month

Who pays for it
$21 per resident a year

Typical for a library this size: $36. Operating budget $5.1M.

Local taxes 95%State 5%

Last year the library lent and hosted about $15M worth of books, e-books, programs and Wi-Fi on a $5.1M budget.

Fine-free. No late fees on books returned late.

Retail prices are typical, rounded down: a new book $17, a kids’ book $12, an e-book or e-audiobook $15, a movie rental $4, a class or program $10, a computer or Wi-Fi session $3. The average cardholder’s month = the library’s yearly loans, attendance and Wi-Fi sessions ÷ its 68,127 cardholders ÷ 12.

Next door

Libraries next door

Who has a library of their own, and how much each town borrows. Tap a town to see its library.

12+ loans per resident8–124–8Under 4No library / shared system
TownLibraryLoans per residentHoursCivic life
Mount PleasantMt. Pleasant Branch Library fine-free—54B+
ConcordCabarrus County Public Library fine-free—60C

Loans = print + digital items borrowed in the library’s fiscal year, per person it serves. — = no library of its own, a county or regional system (its numbers cover many towns), or no report. Civic life: — = not graded (unincorporated places, whose nonprofits can’t be placed by mailing address, or towns with fewer than two of the three inputs).

How to read these numbers

What this data can and can’t tell you

From the Public Libraries Survey, fiscal year 2024.

  • System-wide. Mt. Pleasant Branch Library is one branch of Cabarrus County Public Library, so the yearly numbers cover every branch and all 242,880 people it serves.

Hours are the survey’s yearly average; libraries are compared with others serving about as many people. How TownRatings uses library figures →

Questions about the library and civic life in Mount Pleasant

Does Mount Pleasant have a public library?

Yes: Mt. Pleasant Branch Library, 8556 Cook St., is a branch of Cabarrus County Public Library, which serves 242,880 people. The branch is open about 54 hours a week, averaged over the year.

Is Cabarrus County Public Library fine-free? Does it lend e-books?

Yes to both: no late fees, and e-books, audiobooks and research databases with a card (the library’s 2024 survey report).

How busy is Mount Pleasant’s library?

It logged 1.3 visits and lent 4.2 items per resident in 2024, against a typical 2.1 visits for libraries serving 100,000+ people.

What is Mount Pleasant’s civic life grade?

B+ Mount Pleasant is ahead of 67% of U.S. towns on civic life. The grade combines library visits per resident, community nonprofits per 1,000 residents and the share of adults 25–44 in volunteering groups. It’s a character grade, so it isn’t part of the overall grade. How it works.

Book talk

Reading, story times and the library in Mount Pleasant.

Town Square →
Start a conversation

Libraries: Institute of Museum and Library Services, Public Libraries Survey, fiscal year 2024. Each library reports its own numbers. Distances are straight-line from the town center. “What your card is worth” uses typical retail prices and is an estimate, not an official figure.