During the Flint water crisis, the library played a key role supporting the community, and in the aftermath it partnered with StoryCorps to create oral history interviews of residents' experiences.

[2] In 1981, the Flint Public Library began holding the Michigan Storytellers Festival, which has been hosted both on site and at Crossroads Village in Genesee County.

[3][4] It has been attended by nationally prominent storytellers, including the Georgia Sea Island Singers, Bil Lepp, and Johnny Moses.

[7] In the aftermath of the Flint water crisis, the library partnered with StoryCorps to create oral history interviews of residents' experiences, starting in 2016; this built off a previous, pre-water crisis partnership and resulted in interview recordings being deposited at the Library of Congress.

[9] In February 2020, the library closed to allow for major renovations, and in July 2020 it opened a temporary location at Courtland Center in Burton.

[16] The library board partnered with OPN Architects to create a proposed $24-million renovation to the building, with the primary goals of maximizing the amount of the building's 94,000 square feet (8,700 m2) of space that is used publicly, keeping parts of the library open after regular hours, expanding the children's and teen areas, and creating a quiet zone.