It has over 200 members from Alaska, Alberta, British Columbia, Idaho, Montana, Oregon and Washington.
[3] It was sponsored by the Washington Library Association and was formed by thirty-five librarians from Washington, Oregon, and British Columbia who met at the University of Washington to create an organization to overcome the "geographic isolation" which separated libraries in the Pacific Northwest from other libraries in the eastern and central parts of the United States.
[3] Some of the early initiatives of PNLA included advocating for library legislation in Alaska and the Yukon, as well as formation of the Subscription Book Committee which published Subscription Books Bulletin.
The newsletter was eventually taken over by the American Library Association and merged into ALA Booklist.
[4] In 1972 PNLA published Index of Pacific Northwest Portraits, an index to the illustrations of 12,000 men and women with historical importance in the states of Alaska, British Columbia, Idaho, Montana, Oregon and Washington, which appear in over 350 publications.