Attending: Leslie Schoenherr, President; Paula Polk, Past President; Dee Magnoni, Vice President; Cathy Lee, Treasurer; Bobbie Myles, Clerk; Tom Jewell; Jeanne Smyth; Paul Kissman, MBLC; Sunny Vandermark, Beth Gallaway, Rita Gavelis; Metrowest
Meeting called to order @ 2:35
Motion to accept: Magnoni/ Lee. Motion was approved.
Jeanne Smyth told us about her career in public school libraries. She started as a teacher and went back to school to get a masters degree in educational media. Now she works at the Bedford High School library.
Add $500 to phone, add $500 to in-state travel, and reduce funds for out of state travel. If up to $13,529 of interest money is added to the budget, Metrowest will be able to renew the current databases for FY2007. Other projects funded with interest money this fiscal year are: $15,000 for strategic planning, plus the purchase of 3 laptops and a large screen monitor. The balance in the interest account after these expenditures is more than $50,000.
Motion to accept: Jewell/Magnoni. Motion was approved.
Since the April meeting, Sunny met with both Commonwealth Carriers and U.S. Ground/Waltham Couriers. She explained the requirements for the delivery system. They both told Sunny that they believe they can do the job well. Their bids are expected shortly.
This committee will have approximately ten people: Leslie, Dee, Paula, Cathy from the Executive Board will meet on May 31. A larger group of Metrowest members will meet on June 28 & 29. Meetings will be moderated/facilitated by Becky Schreiber.
Infotrac: OCLC first search, NY Times
Newsbank: BG, BH, Worcester Telegram, NY Times
Gale: Gen Ref Gold, Expanded Academic, Bio Resource Center
Suggestions for new databases: Ancestry.com, Science Resource Center 81% of the libraries responding to the survey provide additional databases to what Metrowest offers such as Ancestry.com and Ebsco.
59% said they stopped subscribing to some periodicals because Metrowest offers them in the online databases.
The “what population do you serve?” question only allowed one answer but some libraries serve all of the populations so the responses to this question are incomplete.
Survey respondents were allowed to make comments. Some of the respondents want the Student Resource Center database back. Other respondents made favorable comments about Metrowest offering these databases.
Beth Gallaway went to Nobles and Greenough School and talked to students about Wikipedia and video games. She also went to Ashland and Arlington to discuss teen issues.
Rita has been updating Metrowest’s web site with cascading style sheets so they load faster and can be read on a variety of screens such as cell phones, PDAs, and computer monitors.
Beth promoted the video gaming program on 5/22 at Olin College.
On Monday May 8 all Metrowest staff went to extreme customer service training, which they found very useful. Metrowest went out to bid for ILL services and received one bid proposal from Wellesley Public Library. The proposal was good and the selection committee recommended that Wellesley be awarded the contract. The price of the contract, $205,000, is about $5,000 less than what Metrowest paid in 2006. Metrowest will have a three year contract through June 30, 2009. A board vote is required at the June 14, 2006 meeting.
BPL now has a floating collection. The way it works is that BPL purchases a large number of items in a category, such as DVDs or a summer reading collection. If a patron at a branch wants a DVD, the DVD goes to the branch and stays there after the patron has returned it until the DVD is requested somewhere else.
BPL has a contract with Overdrive that allows patrons to download audio books. As of last month, patrons can download videos at BPL using fast Internet connections. Interestingly, the new electronic options are bringing in new patrons, not getting existing patrons to switch over to the new services.
House budget was modified to increase the number of waivers from 10 to 55 libraries each year.
MBLC will reprint the public library directory over the summer. Each public library needs to check MBLC’s web site and update its information as necessary. The deadline for making the updates is May 15.
The statewide database survey will end on May 15. MBLC needs more money to support the databases and plans to host a database summit, like the one that was done five years ago, to determine which databases MBLC might offer in the future.
Sunny explained the data collected through the delivery survey.
The Regions and MassCat will pay $1,700 per year to Nelinet beginning FY 2007 in membership fees. This is less than what Nelinet charged last year.
Meeting adjourned @ 3:55
NEXT EXECUTIVE BOARD MEETING: June 14, 2006
I attended the Regional Administrators/MBLC Liaisons meeting at the Southeast Region on April 13th. We discussed the tentative plans to review the state aid program, one of the MBLC strategic plan focus topics.
The Metrowest Database Survey has been implemented (April 25th-May 8th). Preliminary results of the database survey will be discussed at the Board meeting on May 10th. An expanded report will be available on the Metrowest webpage before the end of May.
Metrowest completed its semi-annual delivery survey. Numbers for the week are down approximately 7% from the previous survey April 2005. The decrease is influenced by MLN’s restriction on DVDs and the March implementation of priority paging. Earlier this week Carol Mitchitson sent me an updated spreadsheet of the pickup/delivery totals. Eastern Connection indicated that the number is inching up again toward 1,750 bins after several weeks of lower bin counts.
On April 25th I met with Commonwealth Carriers to discuss a potential bid for delivery services. The company is interested and will submit a bid based on the number of bins per stop, not a flat fee per stop. I haven’t received the bid yet. In addition, I contacted Waltham Couriers to discuss a possible bid. I am meeting with them on Tuesday morning. Although I have contacted Eastern Connection several times since the last Board Meeting I still do not have the contract addendum language finalized.
The Statewide Delivery Committee met again on May 3rd. We discussed the Best Practices document being written by a sub-committee. Committee members also talked about Floating Collections (recently developed at the BPL), automated materials handling systems, the potential of mailing DVDs to library users, and the possible impact of downloadable DVDs and CDs on delivery. Since a number of MLN libraries are implementing Overdrive’s downloadable books starting in July, it will be interesting to see if this impacts on the number of Books-on-tape and/or Books-on-CD that go in delivery. Consensus supports the idea that this service will attract new library users, not reduce delivery.
The most exciting development for delivery is the beta test that MLN is doing on pre-printed slips. The potential is excellent.
I attended the MBLC meeting in Boston on May 4th. The MBLC provided funds for the Speaker on Extreme Customer Service, a program being held in conjunction with MLA’s annual business meeting. 200 librarians have registered for the program,. Including all Metrowest staff. Metrowest is the fiscal agent for the program. In addition, Carol produced the 200 plus copies of the Extreme Customer Service program handouts, and Judy produced the name tags.
I attended the 3M sponsored Libraries of the Future held at Bentley College. The program was interesting. However, the main attraction for me was a tour of the new Library. It is amazing, with a number of technology related services.
See you all on Wednesday May 10th at 2:30 pm.