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Idaho Library Association Executive Board Meeting November 14, 2000
Present: Larry Almeida, Tim Hillebrand, Ron Force, Charles Bolles, Kay Flowers, Sandi Shropshire, Chris Murphy, Rosmarie Fouad, Sue Bello, Kevin Booe, Jennifer Ashby, Marlene Earnest, Janet Strong.
Larry called the meeting to order 9:33am.
Minutes: Charles moved to approve the minutes of October 7, 2000. Ron seconded. The motion passed.
President’s Report: Larry passed out the Pre-Conference Evaluation (Exhibit A) and the Conference Evaluation (Exhibit B) Patrick Jones and Mike Eisenberg were highly praised. There were a couple comments about the cliquishness Board members. This subject has come up before. We need to reach out to people who are new and make them feel welcome. The following are some of the suggestions for doing so. Have mentors for new people; have a new member/first time attendees' session/identify board members at first general session; have division chairs get a list of people in their division make an effort to welcome newcomers. The Conference Planning Committee will talk about having board members introduced and having them talk a little about where people might get involved.
Vice-President’s Report: The conference planning meeting this morning went well. Marlene and Janet visited the site for the conference in Pocatello. They went over the contracts with the hotel people. The meals are high priced and there a currently no vegetarian options. They will work with the hotel to resolve this. Janet is working on getting a supplier for pipe and drape. They will need to get it from the Boise area because no one in the Pocatello supplies it. The site will be a little tight, but should work well. It is all in one building with simple layout. The committee still needs to work on budget. Marlene is very pleased with the site committee.
The Executive Board needs to approve the theme for the conference, which is:
Libraries: Information Flashpoints
Kevin moved to adopt the theme and Charles seconded. The motion passed.
Treasurer’s Report: (Exhibit C)
Sandi introduced Chris Murphy from Ketchum, who will become our new Treasurer on January 1, 2001.
Total attendance at the Annual Conference was192. We made $16,236.80 on the conference. Total net income for the year $22,401.54. The Red Lion Bill just came in and is reflected in the report with the handwritten numbers. There were 128 total attendees for the preconference.
Past President’s Report: Ron is cleaning up the remnants of the Idaho Librarian. He has sent letters to advertisers telling them to contact him for a refund. He has contacted publishers and told them to send review copies to Sandi. He still needs to refund $175 to Ebsco for ads.
State Librarian: No report
Education Media Division Chair Report: The Division sent a survey to school librarians throughout the state. They are getting lots of good information. Sue submitted a budget request for Idaho Library Media Coalition Meeting in the spring (Exhibit D). The Idaho Education Association is providing the building and legal help. The question arose as to whether all of the people for whom travel is being requested are ILA members. Last year we paid for all ILA members and the IEA paid for the teacher. Sue should check with Sandi to see if Chris McFarland is an ILA member and submit final budget request for January meeting.
Sue was asked what was the purpose of the meeting and she gave a quick synopsis of what they have been doing. Last year they did a strategic plan to get certified elementary librarians in all Idaho elementary schools and they are working on training current staff. They are also working on a standard for skills that students should have at each level.
We have budgeted $1000.00 for this meeting this year. If IEA pays for the teacher, the request will easily fall within the budget.
Public Library Division Report: (Exhibit E) Robert Wright is working on a salary survey of public library directors in Idaho. They also discussed having several roundtables at the next conference and Kevin suggests we do more as a Board to facilitate roundtables They hope to publish list of bond elections and campaigns in the last five years to aid libraries on the verge of their own campaigns/elections.
Trustees/Friends Division: (Exhibit F) ) Tim wants to create a database of trustees and friends in the state. He wanted to know where to get the information or whether he will need to generate it. The State Library can give him a list of libraries and list of trustees.
He hopes to have programs just for trustees and friends at conference and to have them in a consolidated period of time to increase the likelihood of people being able to attend.
He submitted a budget request for $1500.00 for a mailing to increase membership. Larry asked him to come back in January with a proposal broken down into specific costs. There are roughly 550 trustees and 130 libraries that have Friends groups.
There was discussion of the confidentiality of member address lists.
Academic/Special Division Chair: Romy: The minutes from the Academic/Special Libraries Division meeting have vanished, so Romy has no written report, but did report the following verbally. The Division came up with 2 plans of action. 1. To help Carol Silvers on her project to create a Government Information Locator Service for Idaho. They hope to have a concrete plan and goals for this by January.
The Division wants to work with teachers to address the lack of knowledge in students when they get to the college/university library. This will be a huge project. There are people from U of I, BSU, ISU, and LCSC checking on offering credit to teachers who take part in these workshops. Romy will figure out whom to contact in the schools (teachers, principals, media specialists). She may approach the Educational Media Division to see about making this a cooperative effort. Romy is requesting $300 for a mailing, which she will submit formally in January.
PNLA Representative's Report: The next PNLA Conference is in Corvallis, August 8-10, 2000. The theme is: Libraries in the Ring of Fire: Feeling the Heat.
It is a joint conference with the Hawaiian Library Association. PNLA is also working on a joint conference with the Montana Library Association for 2002.
Beth Brin and Janet have secured LOEX-of-the-WEST in Boise for 2004. It is limited to 200 people.
ALA Representative: ALA chapter representatives are working on how to get people to stay for the 2nd night of state conferences. ALA Mid-Winter is in Washington, DC in January. Kay will be leaving almost directly from the Legislative breakfast to go there.
BUSINESS:
Strategic Plan: (Exhibit G) We will divide it up like we have in previous years.
Tim and Larry will take Goal #1.
Charlie and Kevin will take Goal #2.
Jennifer and Marlene and John Pool will take Goal #3.
Janet, Sue and Romy will take Goal #4.
Ron and Kay will take Goal #5.
Please have suggestions ready for any modifications for the January meeting.
Membership Changes: (Exhibit H) Anne Abrams has developed a plan for a membership campaign. It is full of good ideas, especially the bumper stickers and membership directory. The following questions were brought up:
· Does corporate membership give the corporation access to the mailing list? · Institutional membership does not currently entitle employees to register for the conference at a membership rate. If we make the change to the way it is in 4, bullet 3, it would need to be made very clear how the registrant is being counted. · Is $10.00 too little? Charlie suggests we try it for a year and see how many renew, then evaluate the rate. · Another suggestion that is not on the proposal would be to really boost the non-member conference rate. This is probably the same effect as the 25% conference discount. Would 25% apply to regional conferences? Larry thinks yes. Romy is concerned that that would be too hard for people from really small libraries who can’t afford the non-member rate.
We broke for lunch and came back to discuss the membership plan some more. We went through it step by step to determine how people felt about it.
Benefits Problems with Part 1, # 3. We do not target income for expenses.
Part 2, #4 Is this for all conferences or just the annual conference?
Goals #3 should be $2000.00
Membership dues Part 1, bullet #3. What extra work is involved and who does it? Bullet #4, part a. What will be included in legislative session booklet? There is a very short window of time (2 mo.) between when dues are paid and when the legislative session begins. Who is responsible for doing this? When will the membership directory be printed? People pay dues year round, so will there be a cut off date? If we do it electronically, there are confidentiality issues.
Part 2 Let’s try the incentive rate as a three-year pilot project. Do people renew their memberships?
Part 4 – This might hurt the tiny libraries – we don’t have enough information to determine this right now – it needs to be investigated. Sandi will find out how many institutions fall into each category for institutional membership
Part 4, bullet 3. This might really complicate things.
Part 4, bullet 5. Why would the person get a letter the Legislative Committee Chair. Probably because the money is targeted for advocacy/lobbying in the Benefits sections. If we do not target the money (which we usually do not) then the Legislative Chair would probably not be expected to write the letters.
Part 5. Do corporate members have access to the membership list? They will expect to have access. If we were doing a directory, they would have access to it.
Part 5, bullet 4 Is this too complicated for the Exhibits Chair? What about having the membership fee be an additional fee added onto exhibit fee. It was suggested that we bundle benefits (exhibit space, web recognition, mention in the conference program, directory recognition). We would have an individual price for each or slightly lower price for bundle. After discussion, it was decided that we should stick with the method in the proposal because other options are too complicated.
Charlie recommended that we talk to a couple of corporate sponsors to see how they would feel the corporate membership.
Larry suggested an ad hoc committee to work with Anne, bringing her our concerns, to come up with a revised plan.
Table this proposal – too many issues with the corporate membership
Long-term planning of legislative activity: Vicki Kreimeyer Brown and John Watts, ILA Lobbyist came for this portion of the meeting.
They asked that we agree upon method to get feedback from ILA – a Rapid Response Method with a – 24 hour consultation turn around. We decided that they should contact Larry, or if he is unavailable, Marlene. If they need more broad-based input, we will use the Board email list.
At the annual meeting in 1999, Lynn Melton talked to the Board, about making a policy stance on issues that impact libraries so that if it does come up they will know what to do. The issues discussed at that meeting were: a. Filtering b. Public Library being directed to take action by board members rather than by directors c. Size of library board membership and methods by which board members can be removed
Exhibit I, formerly Attachment IXB of the November 3, 1999 Executive Board Meeting, contains the approved statements that should be used in making decisions on how to lobby on particular matters:
Vicki noted that John's budget request will have base sum, as well as additional costs for special lobbying. She will need funds for the cost of the legislative breakfast and publishing the booklet on bills before the legislature. Her proposal will be for approximately $1,300.00.
John talked about what we might expect from this session. Last year there were rumors of bills dealing with moral/social issues, such as placement of books in library, internet access, removal of board members. This was largely due to what was happening in Boise & Nampa. The Christian Coalition and those types of groups are now going for a ban on public funding of abortion, parental consent - issues with big fundraising potential.
Issues that will dominate the legislature are what to do with the surplus. This is a good time to ask for more money. Higher education is going for a lot of this extra money. The IEA will be pursuing money for teacher salaries. They will definitely be looking for tax relief and possibly shifting of property taxes. We need to keep eye on special district tax cuts, changes in exemptions.
There is currently no well organized opposition to libraries and library issues.
The Internet issue has life of its own. There may still be problems with controlling boards. Other than that, we need to keep our eyes out for financial impact.
Charlie added that the State Library & ILA sponsored legislative workshops again. On two of those occasions, legislators suggested that there might be state aid available for public libraries.
The bill to make minors eligible to serve on boards has come to a halt. The person initiating the bill now has minor liaisons so that bill will probably not reappear.
The State Library is forming a task force for legislative planning. It is in the beginning stages.
We need to work on long-term planning for legislative activities. We need to know the year before we want to do something and what, exactly, we want to do.
UCITA is not being talked about at the state legislature at this point. It is, however, something to watch out for. It looks good on the surface, so it could slip through if we are not careful. If it happens, it will probably happen really fast. It would probably come through the commerce committee.
There will be a three hour teleconference December 13, 11am-2pm MST at Uof I, BSU & ISU on UCITA. The people who support UCITA come in with their own lobbying groups to push it through.
Our Attorney General has signed off on a letter against UCITA.
Web Issues: Our web page out of date. Dan asked that we be sure to send him the content on a regular basis, especially division minutes. Please send things for the webpage to dan@idaholibraries.org. If you’ve sent draft minutes, make sure you let him know when they are approved. Dan's preferred format for submitting content for the webpage is Word, but he can deal with WordPerfect, etc. He reminded us not to use the Tab key, just make a table.
We need a note on web page saying that the Idaho Librarian has ceased publication. Romy’s review of Mike Eisenberg’s Big6 Workshop is now up on the web page.
Dan asked about whether we would be doing Book Reviews and editorials as were in the old Idaho Librarian. Yes, Sandi will be doing this. Sandi is wondering about adapting the Idaho Librarian editor’s position into an electronic version which would in no way supplant the web master’s position. Sandi and Dan will work together to develop this idea. Sandi presented a job description (Exhibit J). Dan’s role is more of the publisher, Sandi’s role would be as the editor. This would take effect January 1, 2001.
Charlie moved to create the Electronic Editor's position subject to approval of the job description. Jennifer seconded. The motion carried.
Sandi will work to modify the ILA membership form to include a place for people to include their preference to have address their addresses published on the web or not and to not distinguish between member and non-member trustees.
Spring Conference Chair Approval: (Exhibit K) Ron moved to approve the Spring Conference Chairs for 2000-2001 be accepted. Marlene seconded. The motion carried.
Site Review: We are scheduled in Boise at the West Coast Hotel for the 2001 Annual Conference. Janet will check on the size of exhibit space in Post Falls so we can plan ahead if there are complications. Larry suggested looking for possible site coordinators early. We need work on being more inclusive.
Charlie asked when the Conference Coordinator will be appointed. S/he should have been appointed in October. Larry and Ron will work together to make the appointment.
Budget Questions: Sandi would like our budget estimates as soon as you can get them to her.
Projected Budget for the 2001 Conference (Exhibit L).
Lifetime Memberships:Shhh! It’s a secret - Larry read a letter from Diane Broom, Awards Committee Chair, recommending that we award Vaughn Overlie with a Lifetime Membership. She recommended that we give the award at the Regional Conference and mention it at the Annual Conference. Sandi moved to give the lifetime membership and present it at the Region II Spring Conference and to mention it at Annual Conference. Romy seconded. The motion carried.
This was Sandi’s last meeting. THANK YOU SANDI!!! for all your hard work and dedication.
The meeting was adjourned at 3:42pm. |
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