Alum Kristin Anderson Leaves Strong Foundation for Walnut Creek Library

SAN JOSE MERCURY NEWS -- When Kristin Anderson stepped into her position as the Walnut Creek Library Foundation’s executive director in 2006, the downtown library was housed in a 45-year-old, 9,234-square-foot building. Eight years later, with a new marriage and a daughter in her first year of college in the Midwest sweeping her to Chicago, Anderson will leave behind a 42,000-square-foot, two-story, $40 million library completed in 2010. The foundation raised approximately $5.5 million in private donations for the construction, and for $180,000 in improvements to the city’s Ygnacio Valley Library branch. Anderson, an Illinois native, jumped from Cape Cod to San Diego before landing in the Bay Area in 1987. She earned her undergraduate degree in communications from San Francisco State University and a Master’s in early childhood education from Saint Mary’s College.