Meeting Minutes

Maine State Library Studio

Meeting called to order at 10:05. In attendance: Liz Doucett, Janet Blood (via telephone), Pam Turner, Karen LaForgia, Cindy White, Martha Ott, James Jackson Sanborn, Molly Larson (sitting in from Rockport Public Library), Judy Frost and Steve Norman.

Maine Infonet – James

Gave an update on Maine Infonet staffing. Deb Hensler has left. Both her position and Jon Forest’s are vacant and are frozen. He is hoping to open the positions up via an exemption from the Budget/Governor’s office. In the meantime they are sharing responsibilities for covering issues that come up. Bonnie Collins is finishing up providing cataloging support and Ellen Conway will pick up her hours.

45 of the 62 MINERVA libraries are members of Maine Download for the Overdrive downloadable audio books. Feb. 23 is still the go live date. He has ordered OCLC records which will go in the catalog.

Judy Frost noted that she wanted to thank James for working so hard to integrate the various components of Maine Infonet and being proactive on programs like Overdrive.

Minerva Technical – James

They have set up profiles of loan rules to develop a matrix of options for libraries. They have shut down server 1 which is about 8 years old and are addressing issues as they come up. He also indicated that they plan to change status code from “owns” to “temp unavailable” as being clearer to the patron.

Finance

We are getting our last membership check so MINERVA will be fully funded. Jay/Pam will pull together next year’s budget so that it can be reviewed at the spring users’ council. The Board reviewed this month’s budget.

Circulation Standards Committee

Steve Norman moved and Martha Ott seconded to approve the following proposed policy:

“The keystone to the success of Minerva as a consortium lies in the ongoing respect among members for the local ownership and control of individual item and patron records.

In order to preserve the integrity of records, and to facilitate the movement of materials across the network, no member may edit or otherwise alter item or patron records belonging to another member, nor may they override or otherwise work around “blocks” and/or limitations imposed by the system (such as circulation periods, renewal eligibility, replacement charges, etc.), without first consulting with the owning library.”

There was some discussion.

The policy was passed unanimously.

Cataloging Standards Committee

Report reviewed from the Cataloging Standards Committee.

Statistics

No report from statistics but they will be meeting on Friday.

Membership

The Committee will be working on a standardization project – developing a notebook of policy – a manual with basic “how-to’s” and people to contact with specific issues.

Pam is putting together an authoritative contact list for Minerva.

The Board discussed a proposed “Minerva Non-payment Policy”. Changes will be made to the proposed policy and then voted on by the Board and presented to the Users Council.

Nominations

Martha Ott indicated there was some interest in nominations for the available positions to fill Pam, Karen and Amy’s positions. The deadline for nominations is March 11.