CALL TO ORDER AND APPROVAL OF AGENDA
The regular meeting of the Rochester Public Library Board of Trustees Meeting was called to order by Dick Hall.
Members present: Jerry Balm, Chris Colby, Ed Haskell, Dick Hall, Tonya Holt, Naomi Lipsky, Steve McMaster & Dave Nelson
Members absent: Betty Hutchins
Staff present: Audrey Betcher, Library Director; Tom Dyer, Communications Manager; Kim Edson, Head of Reader Services Division; Carrie Farrow, Head of Circulation Division; Louise Moe, Head of Reference Services; Rebecca Splittstoesser, Head of Technical Services; Beth Warfield, Head of Children's Division; Purna Gurung, Office Services Coordinator.
Others present: Al Dollerschell, Friends of Rochester Public Library
APPROVAL OF MINUTES
Ed Haskell moved, Dave Nelson second, to approve the meeting minutes from August 20, 2003. Motion approved.
APPROVAL OF BILLS
Audrey pointed out that the bill for the chiller repair to date came up to $15,000.
Ed Haskell moved, Jerry Balm second, to approve the bills as submitted. Motion approved.
MONTHLY REPORT
Ed Haskell moved, Jerry Balm second, to approve the July & August 2003 monthly report as submitted. Motion approved.
FOUNDATION REPORT
The Foundation Board approved two undesignated gifts and a revised investment policy. The Foundation has a policy that its Board approve any undesignated gifts. We received donations from an individual and from the Lions Club. The Development Committee has outlined a two pronged strategy to approach donors. The Committee is also working on narrowing the prospect list and coming up with a shorter version of the fund-raising presentation for businesses.
SELCO REPORT
SELCO came up on their new system on schedule (www.selco.info) The Post Bulletin published an article today about SELCO's 9/2/03 conversion and RPL's upcoming conversion.
There is some confusion among patrons. Some SELCO libraries are telling their patrons that they cannot borrow from RPL. We are not refusing to send materials. There is only so much we can do about what the patrons from other libraries are hearing (or think they are hearing) at their home libraries.
ILL is unmediated on the SELCO system. There are pros and cons to this. If a patron wants a particular item and the home location's copy is checked out, the system will automatically search other libraries and place an ILL request. There are also fewer requests from other libraries to RPL since SELCO searches its system first before RPL. We will be receiving a bill from SELCO for work that they did to extract our data for DRAOUT.
COMMITTEE REPORTS
Ad Hoc Budget Committee: None
Planning Committee: The Planning Committee met this afternoon and have resolved to meet again next month. They anticipate having a draft of the strategic plan ready for the December Board meeting. After the plan is ready, the committee would like feedback from the Board about the direction and format of said document.
Policy Committee: None.
Personnel Committee: The Personnel Committee needs to meet to discuss the Director's annual evaluation, which is due on November 1. Dick Hall volunteered to serve as the chair.
STUDENT REPRESENTATIVE
Kim Edson has identified a possible candidate for the post of Student Representative. Naomi Lipsky approached this candidate, who is an active library user, about serving on the Youth Advisory and Library Board and he has accepted. The candidate still has to go through the application process. There is an opportunity to have two members of the Youth Advisory Board serve on the Library Board so please feel free to make recommendations to Kim.
The current policy dictates that the Student Representative on the Library Board has to be a member of the Youth Advisory Board. This is a one year commitment with a year renewal. Students in their junior year are preferred but we have had representatives in the past in their sophomore year. The Library staff working with the Youth Advisory Board will make the recommendation and the candidate/s will be interviewed by the Library Director and Board President.
ILS UPDATE
We have had two weeks of onsite training, and Jean is attending operator training this week. The production server has been installed. Staff are beginning to test our data on the server. This intensive period of testing will continue through October 13th. We have a few issues that we are currently working through with Sirsi's help. Audrey had a two hour conference call with our project manager to go over all the outstanding issues. After Jean comes back from the operating training, she should be able to make changes to our policy files, which will remedy many of the problems.
Ed asked if the library was going to have the public provide feedback about the new system. We have a group of people working on the web interface. These are staff who do not work on the systems and thus search like our patrons. We have had focus groups come in to provide feedback on different things in the past. However, we do not have a specific plan in place as of yet. We are still on schedule for the November 20 go live date.
BUDGET
The Administrative Team continues to work on refining and setting priorities on some of the options the Board reviewed previously. We also continue to look at possibilities for revenue generation.
The County request went in at $685,179. This is a request for 14.9% of the operating budget. Audrey has not had a confirmation of the budgeted amount. Our request is lower than last year since there is no ILS CIP this year. We are hopeful that since the request is smaller, the County will hold to the formula. Audrey will report back once she hears from the County.
We have heard nothing new from the City. We submitted a flat budget for 2004 and also a summary of the cuts we made for 2003.
The Ad-Hoc Budget Committee reviewed the Board target plus 25% budget proposal put forth by staff on May 15th. Ed recommended that the Board revisit these projected cuts in order for all Board members to have the same understanding. We will review the projected cuts for 2004 at the October Board meeting.
FRIDAY AFTER THANKSGIVING
The Administrative Team continues to look for ways to save dollars. AT recommends that we close the Friday after Thanksgiving to save approximately $4,000.
The day after Thanksgiving is an Observed Holiday for the City of Rochester. We pay a premium to have staff work that day and some divisions struggle to staff the desks. We have reviewed the door count totals for the past three years and the day has typical numbers for a Friday. We would still be open on Saturday and Sunday of that week.
We would have some savings on utilities because we could lower the heat for two days in a row. We will post the closing on our website and also put up signs in advance around the library. Chris pointed out the closing would be a good reality check for the public to make them more aware of the budget situation.
Chris Colby moved, Dave Nelson second, to approve closing the Library the Friday after Thanksgiving. Motion approved.
ANALYSIS OF KEY DATA
We looked at key library data and compared it against population growth figures. In all areas, we are growing faster than the population growth. We are also aggressively cleaning patron records.
CIPA
Jerry Balm asked what the library was doing about CIPA. Audrey informed him that RPL has filtering software on all stations in varying degrees e.g. more restrictive in Children's stations, less in the Young Adult stations and almost none in adult stations. CIPA states a patron can request that the filters be turned off. We are waiting to hear from the FCC about how to implement this act. Jerry stated that he objects to patrons using public funds to view pornography. Ed pointed out the issue of filtering is a complicated one. Audrey added that the act is very subjective. Since the technology is not perfect, you start filtering sites that you don't mean to, e.g. breast cancer.
Our Internet Policy was reviewed by the City Attorney after CIPA was set. We hope to set the filter level according to who's logged in with the new Unicorn system.
It was decided that the Policy Committee would meet to discuss the implications of CIPA and present their findings to the Board. Tonya Holt agreed to serve on the Policy Committee along with Naomi and Betty.
There being no further business, the meeting adjourned.
Respectfully submitted,
Purna Kumari Gurung
Secretary Pro Tem
The next regular meeting of the Library Board will be Wednesday, October 15, 2003, at 4:30 pm in Meeting Room B on the second floor of the library.