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Home My WebLink About1997-03-17 MinutesBOARD OF TRUS I LES MEEETING Fayetteville Public Library March 17,1997 Present: Board members: Michael Thomas, Mark Burdette, Steve Singleton, Mary Parsons, Maury Roberts, Library personnel: Linda Harrison, June Jefferson, David Johnson, Lolly Maxey, Mary Jo Godfrey, Pat Schram, Grace Kerr, and ORL Director Karen Duree. I. . Call to order: Thomas called the meeting to order at 4:00 in the Meeting Room of the Fayetteville Public Library. II Approval of minutes: Roberts moved to approve the minutes of 2-10-97 as submitted and Burdette seconded. All voted AYE. IlI. Correspondence: Harrison said the correspondence was self-explanatory and included several newspaper clippings about the Library and a few letters. She did want to point out the brochures on Managing for Excellence workshops. Parsons reminded the Board that she had gone to a workshop led by Keith Vire and he had offered to come and speak to FPL Board for free. Harrison said she would give Vire a follow-up call to that offer. Parsons asked about the ' display case exhibits, and if there was a time open. Jefferson said there was still a few months open in 1997 and if someone wants to put a display in there to call either her or Johnson. IV. Librarian's Reports A. Statistical and Financial Reports: Harrison presented a revised statistical report which showed that circulation was up, registrations were up, attendance was up, and volunteer hours were also up. There were no questions on the statistical report. On the financial report Harrison said the "This Month" column was one month's figures this year and is actually "this month". Harrison pointed out on page 1 of Detail Trial Balance item 1016 Long -Term development included the new CD which was the gifts from the Chainey's and Jan Trumbo. Burdette asked what the Contracts were on page 1 of the General Ledger. Harrison said that included elevator maintenance contract, copy machine maintenance contract, Guardtronic, Terminix, and the custodian. B. Automation Project: Johnson reported that all of the hardware has arrived, and we are setting it up. The ITTC training is going well. We have been going through the Innovative training sessions with ORL and have started the bar-coding which is going to be a huge task. Everyone is enthusiastic, but it is a growing period in which we are adding a whole new system on top of all the jobs we normally do. The bar-coding will start with the things coming back in the book drop, and then maybe close down a week at some later time to try to get the most of the rest of the collection.. Maybe we can do it during the normally scheduled work week which is the week before Labor Day. Johnson said we need to identify the people who are stickler's for details to do the bar coding inputs. Johnson said he wants the library to be a greater resource to the community in providing information services for those who can't afford their own PC. The public library has a wider mission than the academic libraries in that we offer support in education, business, and recreation areas. C. Report on significant gifts: Harrison reported we have received the Chainey gift of $41,500 and the stock from Jan Trumbo was worth $5,250. We received a gift this month from a Mrs. Leverenz of $1000 to be spent on books. We also received a check from the Happy Hollow Foundation for $500 to fund the Night of a Thousand Stars Event this year. Discussion followed about memorial gifts and how to approach people about that. Schram suggested that when we thank people for a gift we might include information about other areas of gifting. Harrison noted that the Friends are soliciting funds from corporate sources, and Jefferson said what we need is a coordinated effort on all parts so that people are not approached several times by different people all representing the library. D. Report on the roof: Harrison said all she knew is that the bids were received and Poyner was the lowest. She has no information on a starting date. E. Report on 1997 A & P Grant: Godfrey reported that the 1910 census is in place, and the response has been very good. We need to thank the A&P for this grant. The Genealogy department is working on a mailing list to publicize our genealogical collection and our. recent census acquisitions. Information will be sent to Historical and Genealogical Societies, libraries with genealogical materials, and publications dealing with genealogy in the four corners area of Arkansas, Oklahoma, Kansas, and Missouri. This information will also be sent to National Genealogy organizations since FPL is one of the few libraries that have these late censuses. Godfrey was asked about the Jones Center Family History Center. She said their records are different from the ones we have. They are a part of the Latter Day faints Family History Center and have computer CD's, of the things that are in Salt Lake City. We compliment each other. Genealogy has lists of all the local places where genealogy information can be researched.. We have brochures about us at the Chamber of Commerce, the Airport, the visitor centers and the Oklahoma and Missouri state lines. We are also in the directories of genealogical facilities and on the Internet web pages of genealogical facilities. F. Report by Parsons on CD's: Parsons presented a report on the CD's we have and their maturity dates. The Mcllroy CD is the endowment fund CD from which the interest is deposited into the endowment fund checking account. We cannot use the principal of this fund, only the interest. As we get memorials, they are put into an account which draws interest. When the endowment fund CD matures, we withdraw the memorial fund money and combine it with the endowment fund CD to raise the principal amount and roll it over into a new CD from which we spend the interest on books, audio-visual materials, and genealogical materials. There is about $1200 in the memorial fund savings account at Boatmen's which Harrison suggests be withdrawn and added to the $62,200 for a new CD. Burdette suggested a 12 month CD at the Bank of Fayetteville. Parsons said she would talk to the Bank of Fayetteville about interest rates and methods of transfer of the interest to the checking account at Mcllroy. G. Book Signing: The date is set for Thursday May 29 from 4-6 pm. The U of A Press will do posters. The Northwest Arkansas Times will run a notice of the event as their contribution, and the U of A press will pay for catering the event from the Smokehouse. Harrison said she would prefer the event be held in the meeting room because it would be very disruptive to library business. Thomas said he felt very strongly that it should be upstairs. Roberts said he felt the educational value of kids seeing the person who wrote a book would be worthwhile, so he felt that it should be upstairs. Parsons and Singleton agreed. It was decided that the event will be held upstairs with minimal food. V Report on Boatmen's Trust: Harrison reported. that Boatmen's Bank has been sold to Nations Bank, and Nation's Bank is going to sell Boatmen's Trust which is currently handling all our retirement fund. Burdette explained that the company that buys the trust may have a completely different approach to managing the money. Jefferson said local representation is important. Jefferson said she thought TIAA-CREF might be available to us as an educational institution. Everyone agreed that if 11AA-CREF is available, that would be the best choice. Jefferson said she would call and fmd out if that is available. VI. Report on Automation Budget: Harrison presented a report on what has been spent to date on the automation project. Originally $200,000 was allocated for this project, but at that time we did not have a single firm figure, so that was a guess. Now we have some more realistic figures, but there are still some unknown costs that we are not able to project at this time on page 2. Duree and Johnson explained that there have been many unexpected costs that have come up that no one could have predicted. There are also future costs that cannot be anticipated yet. Burdette asked where we went over at this point. Harrison said the equipment costs were higher when we decided to go to "smart" terminals instead of "dumb" terminals at several locations. Johnson added that costs increased when we went for the most "secure" package that we could. We went from a 16 megabyte memory to a 32 megabyte memory in order to run a piece of software called Microsoft NT Workstation which will allow us to control the security level at the individual PC's and at our file server. We will have a Risk 5 level of security where a Risk 6 would be the best. Thomas and Burdette said they would like to be informed of anymore cost overruns as soon as possible. VII. Other Business: Duree said ORL: needs a new air conditioner. Harrison said- it was in the budget. Another meeting was needed to complete the agenda. It was decided to meet Monday 3- 24-97 at 4:00 to continue. VIII Roberts moved to adjourn, Burdette seconded, all voted AYE, and the meeting was adjourned at 6:00. Respectfully submitted by Carolyn Diemente.