Simsbury, CT - Board of Directors Meeting

The meeting was called to order by Gail Ryan, Chairperson at 7:20 P.M. Bert Kaplan moved that the minutes of the February 21, 2001 meeting be approved with the following corrections: Under Friends Committee Reports – Bev Payne reported. On page two under Guidelines for Art Exhibits: correct “their” to there. Second: Anne Erickson. The minutes were approved as corrected.

COMMUNICATIONS: Gail Ryan shared a flyer about a workshop on “Discussion of Library Plans in Progress” to be held May 8 in Orange, CT from 10 AM – 12:30PM. Mrs. Bullock and Dale Cutler will attend.

Mrs. Bullock received a $25.00 check from a West Hartford resident as a thank you for the use of the Library Loan Service. She also received a letter from a couple in Pasadena, CA who had been in Simsbury in March and visited the Library to prepare for a memorial service. They were grateful for the help they received from the librarians.

Mrs. Bullock had a flyer from the Association of CT Library Boards regarding nominations of individuals who could be recognized for outstanding service to libraries. She also had flyers on Libratects programs, information on registering for the CT Library Service Conference in April, an article from The New York Times related to noise in libraries and an article from the March 2nd Wall Street Journal related to reference books on the Internet. She reviewed the distribution of money from 1999-2000 CT State Library funds.

Minutes of a recent Public Building Committee meeting were made available to the Board. It was learned from these minutes that the architect’s contract for the second phase of the building project has not been signed yet.

COMMITTEE REPORTS: Friends: Eileen Zaldonis reported that the new issue of Doorways will be sent out soon. Friends have changed their mailing permit from the Simsbury Post Office to the West Simsbury Post Office. The nominating committee has a slate of officers to be voted on at the May meeting. The collection site for the Book Sale has been changed to a building belonging to the Historical Society.

DIRECTOR’S REPORT: Mrs. Bullock reported that as of March 24th CARL will cease and SIRSI will become the new automated system. A lot of manual work will be necessary during the transition and it is expected that during the first week of April there will be a need for extra help in shelving books. Members of Friends have been asked to volunteer some time, as well as any Board members who might be available. There will be a period of adjustment during the changeover until all the kinks have been worked out. Staff will be working extra hours to facilitate the transition and it is hoped the public will not be too inconvenienced by any delays.

Mrs. Bullock also informed the Board that another $2,000 has been cut from the adult materials budget for 2001-2002. She asked members to attend the Finance Committee’s public hearing on April 3 at Simsbury High School.

Mrs. Ryan and Mrs. Bullock were interviewed by Steven Purdy of Simsbury Life regarding the building project. Mrs. Bullock will be addressing the Junior Women’s Club on the project. At this time there has been no word from Rich Sawitzke on the contract for the architect’s work for phase 2 of the building program. On May 8th Dale Cutler and Mrs. Bullock will present the library expansion project to a statewide meeting. It is hoped that following oral interviews an offer will be made to fill the circulation assistant position.

At the legislative breakfast a plea was made for the continuation of the CT Digital Library through state funding. Currently it is funded through surplus money. The state is launching a campaign for everyone to have a library card so they can access information from www.iconn.org.

The current budget is doing well except for fuel expenses. Since it looks as if the Personnel Account will be under expended a transfer from one account to another should keep things balanced. All Town departments are experiencing unusually high fuel costs.

The controversial policy of filtering on the Internet was briefly reviewed. The CIPA law related to libraries filtering is being challenged by the American Library Association. At this point it appears that if a library filters, a special interest group could sue them, and if they don’t filter, a different interest group could sue. Currently there is no easy solution to the situation.

GUIDELINES FOR EXHIBITS: The written guidelines for exhibits were reviewed individually by members before the meeting. Mrs. Bullock stated that there is a committee from the Library staff who reviews requests for exhibits. Slides or pictures representative of what will be in the exhibit have been requested and on occasion material has been rejected when it was felt not suitable or appropriate for the library. It was the consensus of the Board that, in the future, pictures or slides of the work to be exhibited should be submitted in advance. Also, a representative of the Children’s Department should be on the review committee since so many children’s programs are held in the Program Room where these exhibits are usually held.

Jennifer Keohane was unable to attend this meeting. She will come to the Board’s next meeting. Highlights of the Business Resource Center for 2000-2001 were attached to the Director’s Report.