HomeMy WebLinkAbout1997-05-12 MinutesBOARD OF TRUSTEES MEETING
Fayetteville Public Library
May 12, 1997
Present: Maury Roberts, Steve Singleton, Mark Burdette, Michael
Thomas, Linda Harrison, June Jefferson, Lynaire Hartsell, Lolly
Maxey, Grace Kerr, Pat Schram, Susie Walker, Mary Loots, City
Administrators Steve Davis, Minor Wallace, Don Bailey, and
interested citizen Marilyn Martin.
I. Call to order: Thomas called the meeting to order at 4:00 pm
in the meeting room of the Fayetteville Public Library.
II. Approval of minutes: Singleton moved, and Burdette seconded
to accept the minutes as submitted. All Aye.
III. Correspondence: Duree clarified that the allotments issue is
to be discussed in the May 21 meeting, and that the Ozarks Regional
issues will be discussed at the meeting of May 27 at the Clarion
Inn. Singleton questioned the statement in the memo from Alverson
that the FPL Board suggested hiring a consultant. He said he did
not know that had been discussed at a FPL Board meeting. Duree
said she thought that Alverson thought that FPL Board didn't have
any objections to the hiring of a consultant. Burdette asked if
there had been a notice in the paper about the staff/volunteer
reception. Thomas said he would take care of putting a notice in
the paper.
IV. Librarian's Reports
A. Statistical and Financial Report: Harrison presented the
statistical and financial report. She said all the statistics were
up except the registration of new library cards. Singleton asked
why there was such a discrepancy between budgeted and actual
figures on health insurance, retirement, and unemployment.
Harrison said 1st Quarter figures were higher on unemployment, and
so get smaller over the year. Jefferson said the monthly budgeted
figures were obtained by taking the 12 -month total and dividing by
12. This number will then often not be the same as the actual
monthly figure. Thomas asked about the Building maintenance
figure, and Harrison said that was for the air conditioners. The
returned check to Blue Cross was a billing error on their part.
B. Automation: Harrison presented the current figures on the
automation project. The original estimate of the hardware cost was
$110,000, but actually cost $132,000. We did not project any
amounts in the beginning estimate of $200,000 for consulting and
for training which cost $30,970. Burdette pointed out the 10%
contingency would be $23,407, instead of $2305. This brings the
total to $253,518. Thomas asked if we know some of the costs for
phase 2. Jefferson said we have a better idea of how long it takes
to barcode the books in that we have a range of 8 to 26 an hour.
Many of the other costs are not known. Harrison asked Duree if FPL
could anticipate any help with the barcoding from ORL, since half
of FPL's collection belongs to ORL. Duree said at this time,
probably not, however ORL is barcoding anything that comes through
their office, and that in the future their may be some ORL
employees who could help after most of ORL's collection is
barcoded. Duree also said the barcoding was taking longer than she
had projected it would. Thomas asked about closing an extra week,
and Harrison said she didn't know if it would do much good as slow
as the process is going.
C. Volunteer/Staff Reception: Jefferson reported that because
the reception planned in January got snowed out, we had some double
expenditures such as invitations and mailing costs. The cost of
postage, office supplies used, catering, and 24 hours of staff time
came to $1022.66. 58% of the volunteers invited did not attend,
and 45% of the staff invited did not attend. If you take out the
cost of the staff time, the actual cost was $770.66 of which
$471.98 was covered by Merrill Lynch. Jefferson said she was going
to get in touch with other organizations and see how they recognize
their volunteers. Some of our best volunteers did not attend, so
maybe their are some other ways to recognize our volunteers. Thomas
expressed his appreciation for the Night of 1000 Stars.
V. Trustee's / Committee Reports
A. Treasurer's Report: Parsons was absent so there was no
report.
B. Alternative fund raising: Singleton reported that he had
met with Paul Newton of Charles Schawb, and they are going to
sponsor an electronic version of Morningstar. He said he is not
having as much luck with obtaining a sponsor for Value Line. He
has contacted Arvest, Boatmen's, Dean Witter, and A. G. Edwards.
Thad Hanna of Edward Jones has not said "no". Singleton's other
activity has been in trying to get the brochure out, and wants
input if anyone has any changes. Everything about the brochure,
paper, graphics, and printing, has been donated.
The Long Term Planning and Volunteer Reports were postponed.
VI. Exterior Renovation: Minor Wallace reported on the exterior
restoration project. This includes two ADA compliance requirements
of a ramp on the rear dock to the book return, and panic hardware
on the exits on the north porch. The bids included complete water
proofing of wood, bricks, and steel, ADA door compliance, repair of
planters that are crumbling, and concrete work for ramp and porch
addition. The low bid was $79,680, which is over the City's
budget. Wallace said he met with the contractor and eliminated
everything possible which got the contract down to $74,000.
Wallace said the atrium windows need work to stop the leaks. He
was asked about somehow closing in the atrium with either a
skylight or a roof. He said either of these options would cost
more than window renovation. He said the best thing to do now
would be to remove some of the plant material and lower the level
of the soil to aid the drainage, and then waterproof the window
wall.
Thomas asked Davis what the City would pay for. Davis
reported the City had budgeted some money for waterproofing of FPL
building this year. The City has about $55,000 they can spend on
this project which is about $19,000 short in funding this work.
The City has also spent $40,000 for replacing the roof. Thomas
recommended that FPL take money from Long Term Development to cover
the extra cost. Roberts moved to do this, and Burdette seconded.
Singleton asked if the money was not all available in one year,
might it be available the next year with not all the work being
done at once? Davis said the problem with this is when you go back
with a rebid on a project, the price will probably be higher than
the original price. Singleton said he felt it was a shame to have
to use bequests, etc., that are meant for improvement of the
library (more books, etc.) to hold back deterioation of a city
building. Davis said the City has recognized that they have an
enormous investment in the city buildings, and if they don't
maintain them, they will have to replace them. Duree asked if the
city council could be asked for more money, and Davis said that was
a possibility. Roberts called to vote the motion to take the money
from Long-Term development. Roberts voted AYE, Singleton and
Burdette did not vote. Burdette said he had more questions about
this, and would meet with Davis to discuss the matter, so the
motion to take the money from Long Term Development was withdrawn.
VII. Report on the City Retirement Plan: Don Bailey, City
Personnel Officer, spoke on the City's Retirement Plan. They have
a plan that has two options (1) an employee retirement savings
plan, and (2) a deferred compensation plan which is unique to city
and state governments and is comparable to a 401K plan in the
private sector. The City had problems before with a non-responsive
trustee that was not available to answer the employee's questions.
Bailey suggested that whoever we choose as a trustee should be
close and responsive. The City put out competitive bids, and
decided they wanted a bank as a trustee because of the $100,000
insurance carried on each account in case of fiduciary problems
with the trustee such as malfeasance in their office. This gives
the employees an extra sense of protection. The City pays the
administrative costs of the program, while the employees cost is
simply the transaction costs of the various investment options.
The plan is 100% employee directed, the City Council or the City
management takes no active role in it. There is an employee group
to run the plan based on the plan documents. The trustee handles
all the record-keeping. The employees get monthly performance
numbers and quarterly statements. The City has six investment
options. Every employee has a different risk-comfort level. The
options go from high risk-high return to low risk-low return for
the employee to choose from. The employees contributions and the
employer contributions vest 100% immediately. The City has roughly
a $9,000,000 trust fund and this year the administrative costs of
the plan was less than $40,000. The City has a 99% participation
rate even though it is voluntary. The City has educational
programs which have allowed the City employees to be come
knowledgable investors. Jefferson asked how many people were in
the employee group that made the decisions. Bailey said the group
was seven people who were all volunteers. The group makes
decisions on the plan such as emergency withdrawals. If an
employee has a problem and needs an emergency withdrawal, the group
decides if this meets the criteria for a valid withdrawal. If the
employee is denied, and feels the decision was wrong, there is an
appeal process that he can go through. The group does not make
decisions outside the scope of the plan. The City is the plan
administrator, and the trustee is the custodian of the funds and
does the check writing. The employee can change the investments
monthly, and increase or decrease investments quarterly.
Bailey urged FPL to look at the record-keeping capabilities of
anyone we would choose as a trustee. Jefferson asked how we would
go about getting a new plan legally. Bailey said first don't
terminate the present plan until a new plan is in place. For the
IRS, you can take the present plan and amend it to what you want
the new plan to be. You can amend the present plan in its entirety
if you want to. If we want an employee directed plan like the
City's, we could use the City plan which is already IRS approved.
We would need a separate trust document which would be bid on.
Jefferson asked if the library fund could be coat -tailed onto the
City account since our fund amount of $150,000 is so small compared
to other accounts. Bailey said he didn't think that would be a
problem. Bailey said the Bank of Oklahoma's educational programs
are very good, and ongoing twice a year. FPL needs to decide the
type of plan they want, and if we want one like the City's, he
would be glad to contact the Bank of Oklahoma for us if we like.
Maxey said the present plan we have has no employee input and no
reports. She said she had gotten only one report in 2 1/2 years
and had no idea what was happening with her retirement. Schram
said she wanted more information on the plans that were available
from all sources. Bailey cautioned us to be careful about
administrative costs and front end loads that can be very large
with some plans that insurance companies have. Burdette said it is
also important to research the long-term returns a plan has. It
was decided that we need more input from the staff about the kind
of plan we want.
VIII. Other Business
David Johnson's last day is May 24. He has taken a job at
Tyson's. By next meeting Harrison should have put ads in
professional journals.
IX. Adjournment
Roberts moved to adjourn, and Singleton seconded. All AYE.
Meeting was adjourned at 6:30.
Respectfully submitted by Carolyn Diemente.
