It offers rare free Wi-Fi from a small space. Now Willow’s library could double in size.

Willow's small library has received a grant of nearly $1.7 million from the Mat-Su Health Foundation to double its size within three years.

The library is inside the Willow Community Center, which is the only public gathering place for residents of this unconsolidated community of roughly 2,000 scattered across nearly 700 square miles.

The library also offers the only free Wi-Fi around.

Willow, about 80 miles north of Anchorage, is unofficially known as Alaska's mushing capital because of all the sled dog kennels tucked into trail-threaded muskegs in the area.

Willow's library is notorious for visitors — or at least for cars parked just close enough to get a Wi-Fi signal. The Wi-Fi is available for 23 hours a day; it goes down for an hour after midnight for an equipment reset, and to encourage people to go home.

Built in 1992, the 3,000-square-foot library now attracts far more than Wi-Fi users. About 40,000 people come through the doors per year, Mitchell estimates: locals, tourists in summer and during the Iditarod restart, and a summer reading program that draws more than 100 children a week.

Mitchell calls the grant a much-needed boost, given the tight budgets of the state and the Matanuska-Susitna Borough, which between them traditionally funded about half of library costs.

Under the terms of the grant, the Willow Library Association has 30 months to obtain the rest of the money needed for the expansion from other sources including the state and borough, as well as other grant funding.

The foundation is the nonprofit philanthropic joint owner of Mat-Su Regional Medical Center. It distributes 35 percent of hospital revenues to the community through an ownership agreement that began distributing grants in 2006.

The foundation expects to award $7 million this year, according to spokeswoman Robin Minard.

The foundation announced more than $4.9 million in grants last week. Other awards include $350,000 over three years to the city of Wasilla to enable police officers from Wasilla and Palmer to join a task force working to reduce opioid abuse and more than $1.1. million to Cook Inlet Tribal Council to "fill gaps in adult substance abuse treatment services" for Mat-Su residents.

[Cook Inlet Tribal Council to expand Mat-Su outpatient drug treatment, sells detox facility to Southcentral Foundation]

A nonprofit trying to build a Hatcher Pass downhill ski area received $500,000 over 18 months.

Hatcher Pass Alpine Xperience plans to spend $30,000 on a part-time executive director and the rest toward the $800,000 cost for a triple chairlift, according to board president Louisa Branchflower.