Attending: Leslie Schoenherr, President:; Cathy Lee, Treasurer; Bobbie Myles, Clerk; Tom Viti, Dee Magnoni; Paula Polk; Paul Kissman, MBLC; Sunny Vandermark; MMRLS
Meeting called to order at: 2:35PM
Motion to approve the consent agenda: Dee/Cathy
Dee Magnoni is a well traveled librarian! Dee has lived in various parts of the country and has worked in academic libraries, corporate libraries, and special libraries. She also ran a business as an information broker.
Sunny has revised the Strategic Plan for FY2007 – FY2011 according to the three tier system that Tom Jewell suggested at the last meeting. Tier one includes the top priorities for the coming year. These tasks will use the bulk of staff time and energy. Examples of tier one tasks are: continuing education workshops and professional development for underserved members. Tier two includes tasks that require maintenance and improvement of important priorities. Less staff time is needed. These tasks may include previous tier one initiatives that are now functioning smoothly. Examples of tier two tasks are: delivery and MassCat. Tier three includes maintenance of important but lower priorities. These tasks require the least amount of staff time. Examples include: reference services (that are contracted out) and building partnerships to collaborative agencies such as the Minuteman Library Network.
These priorities are already mapped to staff and Sunny is confident that these goals can be achieved over the five-year period.
Motion to approve the revised draft of the strategic plan Tom/Dee approved
No revisions since last meeting.
Motion to approve the FY2008 Plan of Service Goals Cathy Lee/Dee Magnoni. Montion approved.
Database line is zeroed out for FY2008, which Leslie describes as unacceptable. This year the MBLC came through with extra funding ($33K?). Hopefully there will be additional funding for FY2008. The entire FY2008 budget is $1,378,934 and $555,996 is for delivery.
Motion to approve FY2008 Tom Viti/Leslie Schoenherr
Representatives from 32 states attended the National Delivery Symposium in Denver, CO on 9/14-15. MMRLS pays the most of everyone Sunny spoke to. R.I. pays the least. Some states do pay more than MMRLS, however. There is a web site that people can use to share best practices. She learned about contract requirements that cost more. Examples include delivering to a specific room at the library instead of just to the front desk and delivering at a specific time costs more than delivering at any time during the day.
A company called Velocity purchased CD&L. Sunny told us that the managers at Velocity sound just like the managers of CD&L. Delivery companies are seeing libraries as attractive customers because the banks are not delivering as much due to electronic banking. The delivery companies are looking for new customers with staying power.
Final Statewide Delivery Committee on October 3. (see sheet) These meetings were chaired by Marilyn. A pilot project may result from these committee meetings.
September 28 meeting at Eastern Connection. FKILogistex is a high tech materials handling company which has sorting equipment. To make this work, libraries will need to put their barcodes on the front of their materials. The equipment will use NSIP perhaps to query the MLN database to see where the item is in transit to and send it along to that location. In other words, no transit slips will be necessary. It would cost about $350,000 to purchase this equipment.
Tom explained that MMRLS doesn’t have a blank check for delivery and Minuteman has to curb network transfers. MMRLS may need to tell MLN how many items can be delivered during the fiscal year. Some of the MLN directors do not understand the problem. Leslie will talk to Bill Talentino, President of MLN, about this issue.
Paula has found new members to add to the Board beginning 2007. Two special librarians are needed to fill out the board. Paula asked for recommendations. Officers for the board are also needed.
Motion to approve the slate as it stands today: Leslie Schoenherr/Dee Magnoni. Motion Approved.
November 8, 2006 at Needham Public Library. This is the tenth annual meeting so there will be entertainment and a history of MMRLS. (See purple sheet)
Mostly covered in white sheet already.
Paul Kissman reported on Legislative agenda for FY2008. The MBLC is sticking with the three-year agenda identified last year. Public library construction funds are being addressed through the omnibus bill. (See blue sheet with draft of the legislative agenda.) Increased funding for databases $1.6 million for this year is included in 9506 line item (as is funding for networks like MLN). Public libraries fund is new for FY2007 and has $250,000 for FY2007. The goal of this program is to promote public/private partnerships.
Tom asked Paul about the public library construction grants. Paul explained that all capital items are stalled in the legislature.
A newly formed Authentication Task Force. One charge is to make it easier for patrons to log into the various databases. Possiblity of a statewide library card. At this point developing needs assessment through focus groups. Next Tuesday there will be two focus group sessions (afternoon is for academics only) at Weston Public Library. Policy and practice issues will be discussed. Unify database purchases through the state is an example but then the branding that goes on to advertise who is paying for the database, will be lost. (BPL’s ecard is the same idea on a different track.). Beyond focus groups are web related surveys are available to get more input from end users and from people who are interested but could not attend a focus group. A needs assessment from this task force will be done by January. Then the task force moves into working on solutions. Paul expects this to be a multi-year activity with short term fixes, best practices and long term fixes. Make up of committee, network administrators, regional administrators, academic, school and public libraries. (See Paul’s sheet for info about databases.) Procurement follows state procurement law so won’t know who’s bidding until the bids are delivered.
I made an announcement about Lincoln’s Jazz Brunch to raise money for New Orleans libraries. Leslie thanked everyone for serving on the board.
Respectfully submitted,
Bobbie Myles, Clerk
During the past several weeks I have been working on reformatting the FY2007-2011 Strategic Plan. Please see enclosed document. In the new draft we have provided the strategic visions and goals in a 3 tier approach. Tier 1 (continuing education and cutting edge technology) are top priorities for the coming year and require the bulk of staff time and energy. Tier 2 strategic visions require maintenance and improvement of important priorities. Less staff time is needed. Tier 2 may include previous Tier 1 initiatives that are now functioning smoothly. Tier 3 strategic visions require maintenance of important but lower priorities. The least staff time is required.
After the Strategic Plan is approved, the staff will write their quarterly reports linked to their responsibilities in the strategic plan.
September 14 & September 15, I attended the National Delivery Symposium in Denver CO. Representatives from more than 100 libraries and/or library systems attended. I will report on the Symposium at the Executive Board Meeting on October 11.
On September 18 the Regional Administrators met with the Network Administrators and our MBLC liaisons. During the meeting we did a developed a history timeline of the relationship of the regions and the networks. Rob Maier took the concept from an activity that Metrowest used during its strategic planning sessions “Future Search.”
On September 21st Rita and I attended a Digital Program facilitated by NELINET at Tower Hill/Boylston. The workshop was somewhat disappointing.
On September 27st PALS met at the Central Region. PALS is the Presidents, Administrators and Liaisons from the MBLC. As always, the regions present an overview of regional activities, and Rob gave a presentation on the FY2008 Legislative Agenda.
On September 28th Judy and I spent much of the day looking at delivery possibilities. We met at 9 am at Eastern Connection with representatives from the Northeast Region, Eastern Connection and FLILogistex, a materials handling company. The meeting allowed for several presentations from FLILogistex, including Regional Administrators, and later in the day t Network Administrators and/or their representatives. It was a very informative and potentially exciting presentation.
On September 29th Beth, Rita and I worked help the school library teacher at Maynard High School weed the collection. This is a perfect example of a consulting experience.
On October 3rd I attended the final meeting of the Statewide Delivery Committee. Committee members reviewed the Best Practices document. We have a number of recommendations from the document that we will make. The Committee was an excellent opportunity for regions and networks and libraries to discuss delivery issues and to document best practices.
On October 4th I attended an interview in Woburn with the delivery vendor Velocity. Like FLILogistex, Velocity is trying to provide an automated delivery system. Ultimately automation may be the way for Metrowest delivery to deal with volume.
On October 5th I attended the MBLC Board meeting at the Auburn Public Library. Our FY2007 budget revision was approved.