Minutes

Maine State Library Studio
January 8, 2014

In attendance:  Nancy Crowell, Kevin Davis, Shelly Davis, Judy Frost, Nikki Maounis, Steve Norman, Alisia Revitt (remote), Gail Roy (remote), James Jackson Sanborn (remote), Amber Tatnall (telephone), Pam Turner, Karen Valley, Cindy White (remote)

o Call to Order – Shelly Davis, chair, called the meeting to order at 10:10 am.

o Acceptance of Minutes of the November 13, 2013 Meeting – Nancy Crowell moved to approve the minutes, Steve Norman seconded with the correction of Pam Turner’s name on page 2 under Maine InfoNet website, and the minutes were accepted.

o Old Business

• RDA Toolkit – Shelly Davis reported that letters were sent out to all contacts regarding access.  She received an invoice on Jan. 7 for $7177.50 and has forwarded this to Gail Roy for payment.  Gail will create a new line under Expenses and post the invoice payment there.  Shelly and Gail will work through the process of billing Minerva members individually for their Toolkit subscription amounts.
• Update on BHML –Shelly requested and received an update from Tim McFadden, the Director of the Boothbay Harbor Memorial Library, regarding the temporary location and limiting of the library’s collection.  His email follows these minutes (Appendix A).
• Distributed maintenance of Minerva website

• Investigation of policies – Pam Turner and Kevin Davis spent some time investigating policies on the website, listserv, and other miscellaneous places.  Pam reported that “they are a mess.”  There are discrepancies between minutes and policies; many policies are not dated, attributed or otherwise documented.  James Jackson Sanborn recommended that Pam and Kevin put together a spreadsheet including current policies, documentation, dates, and any other pertinent information.  The board then can look at this and decide what needs to be re-ratified.
• Expectations of committee chairs – Nancy Crowell emailed a preliminary document titled “Responsibilities of all Minerva Standing or Ad hoc Committees, and Roundtables.”  She requested that board members look this over and send her comments prior to the March board meeting.  James noted that asking for meeting agendas to be  posted and emailed two weeks ahead of time might not be realistic.  Nancy asked if there will be protocols for postings on the website (e.g. do not post pdf files as they are not searchable).  Alisia Revitt stated that she follows her own guidelines.  Shelly reiterated that we need definitions of terms such as policy, procedure, best practice, guideline, etc.  Amber Tatnall agreed to work on this.  We will continue the discussion at the March meeting.  Nancy will send the board the “request for action” template that she uses in her library.  Alisia took this opportunity to explain that the issue with distributed maintenance of the Minerva website is a problem with permissions assigned to logins.  We need each login to allow editing of pages assigned to that login; currently the login allows creating and deleting pages, not editing.  Until this is fixed, all postings/changes need to be sent to Alisia with a deadline indicated.

o New Business

• Minerva participation in new III agreement – This item was placed on the agenda in order to document the decision reached via email on December 12/20/2013.  Cindy White made a motion to approve James Jackson Sanborn to act on behalf of Minerva and agree to Minerva’s participation in the new III agreement as outlined in his email of 12/20/2013 (see Appendix B).  Gail Roy seconded the motion and it was approved.  The new contract will begin on 07/01/2014.
•  Delivery bags – Nikki Maounis ordered 600 new bags, medium size.
• FY 2015 budget and dues – Gail Roy emailed a proposed FY 2015 budget.  The annual membership fee is $4200.  The contingency/reserves are set at 2.5%.  Van delivery is budgeted at $18.00 per stop.
  • RDA Toolkit – the board discussed whether we wanted to fund the toolkit for FY 2015.  Nikki said the Camden Public Library cataloguer felt it was no longer needed; Library of Congress and other cataloging sources are sufficient.  Alisia agreed.  The board felt it was too soon to make this decision and decided to leave the money for the RDA Toolkit in the budget with a note that it might be removed.
  • Syndetics – James Jackson Sanborn noted that we don’t get any statistics about the various elements of Syndetics and he wondered if they all are used and if they could be purchased separately.  He personally uses the book covers but not the Choice, LJ etc. reviews.  He is interested in another product, ChiliFresh.  The board asked James to look into ChililFresh and also the possibility of purchasing Syndetics features separately.  Steve Norman made a motion that the FY 2015 budget be approved as presented with the notation that Syndetics, RDA Toolkit and Library Anywhere may be changed and/or removed.  Nikki Maounis seconded and the motion passed.

• Elections for terms expiring in 2014: Nikki Maounis, Gail Roy and Cindy White – Shelly noted the following in the Bylaws:

“Nominations for Board members shall be solicited from among the designated official representatives of member libraries no later than January 30, with ballots to be distributed by March 30. Final results shall be tabulated and announced to the Users Council by April 30”         

 

Shelly asked these three individuals if they were interested in continuing.  All said they would like to be replaced if possible.  Shelly will send out a notice to Minerva-l asking for nominations.

• Spring Users’ Council Meeting – the format will be a central site with several virtual sites.  Date determination and further discussion tabled until March board meeting.

o Reports

• Maine InfoNet (James Jackson Sanborn) – James reported that applications for the library systems training and support position (Alisia Revitt’s former position) are still being reviewed.  Much planning and work is going into the new III configuration.
• Maine InfoNet Representative (Judy Frost) – Judy reported that the board has been dealing with the III contract.  There are two constituency meetings scheduled for January, one at Auburn Public Library and another at Newport Cultural Center.  The turnout at constituency meetings has not been as good as hoped but the conversations have been good.  A report will be forthcoming when the meetings are completed.
• Minerva Technical (Alisia Revitt) – Alisia noted that the system managers are still down by one so please forgive any continued slowness in response to support requests.  She does not foresee any major technical changes in the future.
• Finance (Gail Roy) – Gail submitted her December finance report via email.  There are two Marcive invoices outstanding.  She is going to check on the STACAP fee and why it is so below budget.  She asked if she could send out the pre-July invoices now.  The board felt that this would be okay but suggested she first send an email giving people a heads up that this would be happening.
• Membership Committee (Pam Turner) – Pam reported that Jill LeMay from Kennebunk Free Library has been weeding their collection.  Jill has also been working on a spreadsheet and some test files for James.  Pam has not contacted any new directors since the Minerva policies seem to be a bit disorganized right now.
• Circulation Standards Committee (Cyndi Burne)  – Cyndi sent Shelly a report via email on 12/06/2013 (see Appendix C).
• Cataloging Standards Committee  – Katherine Morgan sent a report by email (Appendix D).  She also sent a pdf of the Minerva RDA Core Policy (https://www.maineinfonet.org/minerva/support/cataloging-serials/rda/) which was “released” on 12/20/2013 to cataloguers via the Minerva and MinervaCats lists.  The board discussed whether or not this was a policy, practice, etc. and what the process should be for adoption.  Alisia stated that she felt there was confusion about what the executive board wanted to approve and what it did not.  Shelly said she will ask the Cataloging Standards Committee (via Katherine Morgan) to come up with language regarding Minerva and RDA and we will revisit this in March.  Steve Norman made a motion that RDA be the standard for Minerva cataloging as of January 1, 2014 and that Minerva libraries adhere to the RDA standards and practices as approved by the Cataloging Standards Committee.  Nikki Maounis seconded the motion and it was passed by the board.

o Other – none.

The next board meeting is scheduled for March 12, 2014.

o Adjournment – Amber Tatnall made a motion to adjourn, Shelly Davis seconded and the meeting adjourned at 12:25 pm.

 

Respectfully submitted,
Cindy White

 

Appendix A.

Email from Tim McFadden on 01/06/2014:

Update on BHML

When the Minerva Executive Board voted to allow BHML, while living in a temporary location, to have only a portion of the collection available for requesting in Minerva and MaineCat while allowing the library’s patrons to maintain full requesting privileges, it was noted that the situation would be monitored closely and revisited by the Executive Board a few weeks after implementation to determine if any unforeseen issues need to be addressed.  I asked BHML director Tim McFadden and Alisia Revitt to each provide an update on this situation for the Board from a library operating/procedures standpoint (Tim) and from the Minerva Technical standpoint (Alisia.) From Tim –

Dear Minerva Executive Board Members:

Regarding the Library’s current ILL workload, we are able to fill most of the Minerva and Maine Cat requests for the items in our temporary location. We run Item Paging, Title Paging, and Inn Reach notices twice per day (Tuesday through Friday) and once on Saturdays.

There are usually approximately 3 requests per day that we cannot fill.  The status for those items is immediately changed to “missing” rather than “unavailable” because we believe they were brought to our temporary location but are not currently on the shelf. This could be due in part to human error. We rely on a lot of volunteer help at the Circulation Desk (several people per day), and, despite training, they will sometimes miss a request. However, these same issues occurred in our permanent location, so most likely don’t effect the current ILL issue. Despite this, we are able to fill the vast majority of requests.

A portion of our Children’s Room collection was selected manually and does not yet show “available” in the catalog.  This anomaly will be corrected before the end of January.

Aside from these internal issues, Alisia’s advice and procedures were foolproof.

• We determined how many items we could house at the temporary location and reported that quantity to Alisia
• Alisia created a list of the most frequently circulated items at BHML during the prior year, cutting off the list at our capacity for the temporary space
• Alisia marked all items NOT on the list as unavailable in the catalog – status q
• We used color coded stickers to identify the items on the list and prepare them for packing and transport
• These stickers made it easy for Noyes Moving to pull the items off the shelves, pack them accordingly, and unpack them in the new location
• From day one in the new space, all items we brought with us showed as “available” in the catalog (except for the Children’s items as explained above).
• We have not gotten ANY requests for items in storage because requests cannot be attached to items with status q (unavailable)

If the Board feels there is an imbalance that needs to be addressed, we would suggest applying a temporary limit of perhaps four requests per patron (per card number) per month.  This would put a control on those who request the most without penalizing those who request less frequently.

We want to express our thanks to Alisia and Maine InfoNet for their help with this process!  And our sincerest thanks to the Minerva Executive Board for your support and understanding during this period of change.  Without the ability to make ILL requests we would not be able to adequately serve our patrons during the renovation of our Library building.  Your willingness to accommodate us during this process is invaluable and we deeply appreciate it.

Sincerely,

Tim McFadden
Director
Boothbay Harbor Memorial Library

Appendix B

James Jackson Sanborn email 0f 12/20/2013:

Good Morning!

I’m reaching out to the Minerva Executive Committee to ask for an email vote for approval for the Minerva participation in the new III agreement, particularly as regards the three one-time costs for Minerva that are associated with that agreement. I’ve included a long email below that can be shared with the Executive Committee.

To provide background, after our long series of conversations with III and our in-person meeting in Portland, we’ve received a new proposal that I feel is great for the State as a whole and provides some very nice features for Minerva in particular.

I’ve attached their full proposal, which covers Minerva, URSUS, MaineCat, Portland Public Library, and UNE  and a new Sierra-based system targeted at small libraries and would take effect on July 1, 2014. (there will be six months of bills to pay between now and then under the old contract).

Looking specifically at the Minerva highlights and fees:

*Once in the new contract Minerva’s annual costs would be slightly LOWER than currently budgeted (total of new III subscription should run= $127,134)

*Annual costs would be held steady for the first 2 years of the contract, then increase by 3% in years 3, 4, and 5.

*Minerva will be asked to pay a one-time fee of $49,400 for services related to dividing the system into two servers, one consisting of Public and School libraries, the other consisting of Academic and Special Libraries. This split will not affect ongoing annual costs (e.g. we get two servers for the price of one).

*Both Minerva systems will be allowed to add as many libraries within the state as we feel are appropriate with no increase in maintenance (this includes MMA and MeCA who would have their contracts canceled if they joined Minerva).

*Minerva will be asked to pay a one-time fee of $81,054 for an upgrade to Sierra (there will also be some hardware costs associated with the upgrade- I do not have estimates for those costs at this time, but I anticipate them to be in the neighborhood of $10,000 or less).

*Once upgraded to Sierra, Minerva will receive a number of upgrades, including: the AirPac system (III’s mobile interface, allowing us to cancel LibraryAnywhere); unlimited SIP2 licenses (allowing any library to add a self-check machine without paying the $3k license- this will also cancel the annual payments for maintenance on previously purchased licenses currently being paid directly by some libraries, unfortunately it will not reimburse any previously paid expenses); unlimited access to the Item Status API (allowing full use of RFID features); once developed (not yet in production) we will also receive the ebook integration module for no added fee.

*Once this is no longer a State contract, Minerva should be free to manage their money as they see fit, not necessarily in the State Trust Fund/STACAP method currently used. This could take the form of having funds and invoices managed by the Maine InfoNet 501(c)3 non-profit.

In summary, annual costs would remain essentially the same, with significant added services and functionality. One-time costs would total $130,454 plus an unknown hardware cost. Current Minerva reserves are in excess of $160,000.

Unfortunately, I need to provide an official acceptance for the whole package to III before the end of the calendar year so that we can lock in the favorable Sierra upgrade price (they want to accrue it to their books this calendar year, even though it will be paid later).

To feel comfortable doing this, I am asking the various financial stakeholders for their approval via email, if possible by December 24th, 2013 (next Tuesday).

I would be happy to answer any and all questions via email or phone, or could help arrange a conference call if we want to have a joint conversation.

All the best

-James
_____________________________
James M Jackson Sanborn
Executive Director, Maine InfoNet

Eight members of the board approved this package via email:

• Shelly Davis  12/23/2013
• Nikki Maounis  12/20/2013
• Steve Norman  12/20/2013
• Amber Tatnall  12/20/2013
• Cindy White  12/20/2013
• Karen Valley  12/20/2013
• Nancy Crowell  12/20/2013
• Gail Roy  12/20/2013

Appendix C

Circulation Standards Committee Report

Email from Cyndi Burne on 12/06/2013

From: Cyndi Burne [mailto:cyndi@topshamlibrary.org]
Sent: Friday, December 06, 2013 4:03 PM
To: Shelly Davis
Subject: RE: Minerva website

Hi Shelly,

I have sent a rough draft of 2 policies to the circulation standards committee that addresses the circulation of DVD/Blu-ray combo packs and DVD series set.  Once I receive their feedback I will send the draft to the cataloging standards committee for their feedback.  I am not sure I will have a final document for your consideration in time for the January meeting.  Unfortunately I won’t know by next Friday.  I will let you know as soon as the document is ready.

I also wanted to let you that I will be resigning from the circulation standards committee when these latest policy suggestions are polished enough to send to the executive board.  I am not sure how you find a new chair.  I do know that our standards committee membership has dwindled as people moved on to different jobs or in house demands have increased.

Hope you have a nice vacation

Cyndi Burne
Assistant Director
Topsham Public Library

 

Appendix D

Cataloging Standards Committee January 2014 Report

Email from Katherine Morgan

TO: Minerva Executive Board
FROM: Minerva Cataloging Standards Committee
|RE: January 2014 Report

The committee has finally finished writing the RDA policy for Minerva catalogers that we started in June 2013. The release dates coincided with Minerva gaining access to the RDA Toolkit. We are still editing the policy, as clarifying questions come from catalogers, but the overall policy is what Minerva catalogers will use in conjunction with RDA Toolkit.

The committee has decided not to make hardly any expectations with RDA as we need to get through the first year of cataloging with the new rules.

Minerva RDA Core Policy

The policy was released on December 20, 2013 to catalogers via Minerva-L and MinervaCats listserv.

Minerva RDA Core Policy link https://www.maineinfonet.org/minerva/support/cataloging-serials/rda/

Thank-you The committee wants to thank Ellen Conway for pulling all of our notes and decisions together to form our policy.

We want to thank Alisia Revitt for posting the policy to Maine InfoNet web page so everyone can have access to the policy.

We also want to thank the Executive Board for subsidizing the RDA Toolkit for Minerva catalogers. Without picking up most of the financial burden a majority of libraries in Minerva would not have access to the new cataloging rules that are being followed throughout the cataloging world.

Submitted

Katherine Morgan, chair

 

link to Minerva RDA Core Policy:

https://www.maineinfonet.org/minerva/support/cataloging-serials/rda/