November 14, 2007
Rita Lichtenberg, Antonia Matthew, Kathy Myer, Mercy Ridgrigues, Janet Patterson, and David Warrick.
President Steve Moberly called the meeting to order at 5:48pm in Meeting Room 1B.
Steve made an announcement about the collective bargaining resolution under discussion by the Board. He recommended that the Board make two changes to the resolution: 1) Delete the 75% turnout in the draft and have no minimum turnout in the resolution. If there is a secret ballot vote, the majority voting in the election will prevail. 2) Delete the current prohibition against fair share. At the time if the union is approved, it will be part of the contract negotiations. Steve stated that he planned to recommend both of these at these changes at the Board work session immediately follow today's board meeting.
Steve further recommended to the Board that the resolution be added to the December 19, 2007, Board agenda. He noted the Board had received the request from the employees in mid-April and hopes to act inclusively on it by mid-December. The Board spent spring and early summer successfully obtaining a Capital Projects Fund from county council, prepared a budget for next year, and replaced the director. It will now turn over the Board's attention to these resolutions.
President Steve Moberly presented the minutes of October 10, 2007 and October 17, 2007. Steve requested the October 17, 2007 Board meeting minutes be corrected on page 1H, 3rd paragraph. The word "council" needs to be changed to "counsel".
Penny Austin asked for a correction on the October 10, 2007 work session minutes, page 2E, 2nd paragraph. The sentence "Penny said she was still mixed up" needs to be changed to "Penny said she has mixed feelings".
Steve presented the monthly bills for payment. Brief discussion followed regarding the bills for payment.
Randy Paul asked Sara Laughlin if there are any consultants or contracts that need to be reviewed from the last administration, and gave the example of the consultant from Texas Cindy Gray hired.
Sara replied that the consultant is now paid in full. The only current contracts are with consultant Denise Shockey, and ongoing partnership agreements, including those for CATS funding.
Steve presented the Board calendar. There was brief discussion about the December work session, as John Walsh asked if the work session on December 12 could be moved to December 5.
Steve asked if there was a motion to approve the consent agenda. Penny Austin moved to accept the consent agenda items. John Walsh seconded. The vote was unanimous.
Sara stated the she would like to take this agenda item off today's agenda. After talking to Bara Swinson, she and Bara realized it has been about a year since the Board approved the Circulation policy, and the library has had some changes and tweaks since then. Sara stated that staff need time to made recommendations about policy changes.
Steve agreed to this idea, and asked that Sara bring it back to the Board at the December 19, 2007 meeting.
Bara Swinson presented a report on Circulation. Bara reported she supervises 33 full-time staff, which includes a management team of 3 supervisors, 3 part-time staff who have helped with Polaris, 19 check-out clerks, 4 page chiefs, and 32 pages. Bara spoke about the opportunities and challenges the new computer software has given. She stated the self-service checkout has leveled out at 10% of overall circulation, and staff hope to promote the self-service checkout more in the future.
John Walsh asked what percentage of self-service circulation we are shooting for. Bara replied said maybe 75%, but our service vision isn't focused on this right now. Bara stated she thinks we need to make it attractive to those who will find it appealing.
Steve asked if staff are still providing demonstrations on how to operate the self-service checkout. Bara replied that she has relied on staff outside of Circulation to do this, including staff in Administration and Collection Services.
Bara explained that self-check stations are still in temporary locations, pending renovation and the need to emphasize good things about self check-out without limiting full service. Bara explained the savings of Polaris, in regards to notifications, and its convenience to patrons.
Brief discussion followed regarding the savings, holds procedures, patrons' ability to fill out a library card application online and to use credit cards online to pay fines and fees. There was also discussion on the quarterly report that was presented to the Board and the circulation numbers that are going down.
Randy Paul stated that even though his motions had failed with the board relating to CATS airing work sessions live to the public, he had the idea on his agenda when he joined the Board. He feels a spotlight needs to be focused on work sessions. If members of the public are interested they can come to the work sessions, but if work sessions are televised the public will learn so much about the issues, about every argument, and how every decision is made. He feels it is disrespectful to patrons to not televise work sessions.
The more information the Board sends out to the public, the better. The public wants information. He has 3 1/2 years left in his term and is prepared to bring this topic up forty times more if needed. He proposed a compromise that work sessions be televised for one year starting January, 2008. Then in December 2008 the Board can determine if it wants to continue.
Randy made a motion to televise six work sessions beginning January 2008, and then to have discussion in December 2008 to decide if we want to continue televising work sessions.
Penny Austin seconded.
Discussion followed regarding CATS taping meetings and the cost involved. Randy said he would speak to Michael about the cost.
Steve asked Randy who would make the decision on which six work sessions to tape. Randy replied the Board could decide. Steve also asked how the library determines who is watching CATS. Randy replied that CATS said there is a way, but it isn't very sophisticated. CATS cannot pinpoint a county council meeting from a library meeting.
Randy stated that people have had concerns over issues from work sessions. If the members of the public see something at a work session that concerns them, it will give them information, and then they can come to the next regular Board meeting to speak on it.
Steve wondered how many other government meetings have been televised. Randy said none, but he feels it is a good thing to be a leader in something, and he hopes people will look at us and say this is a good thing.
John Walsh noted that members of the public who are watching from home could not speak at the meeting.
Janice Stockton said "I will bring up as I have before, that there are people who do not like to talk on camera. They don't want to come to a Board meeting and speak on camera. I have been told frequently this. I have begged people in my school board who have concerns, but they will not speak publicly."
Penny asked if regular board meeting and work session minutes are on the library website. Sara replied they are posted after the minutes are approved.
Fred reminded the Board and the public that the media is always welcome to attend Board meetings.
Steve said that he depends on the news—newspapers, television, or radio—but he doesn't believe people are sitting at home watching our library meetings.
Randy said the news media doesn't have bodies or time to attend every library board meeting.
Steve replied that he thinks media make their own calls about newsworthiness.
Steve reminded the Board that we have a motion on the floor. A vote was taken. The vote did not pass. All Trustees except for Randy voted no. Steve declared the motion was denied.
Randy agreed with Janice that people are shy and there are very few who talk. He believes people do have questions or comments. He suggested that if people are given an index card, they can write down a question or comment to be read during public comment.
He made a motion to start allowing questions to be read during public meetings, beginning December 2007 during public comment.
Janice seconded.
Penny asked for time to think about this proposal and the Board agreed to discuss this at its next work session in December.
Randy said he would withdraw his motion to put the topic on the work session agenda in December.
Linda asked if it there would be an ADA issue if someone couldn't read or see. She also wondered if people might think we would re-word comments.
John felt the Board should encourage people to stand up and speak their minds, to hear their tone of voice and the full force of their opinion. His opinion was that the index cards could discourage this.
Steve replied that we can discuss this in work session.
There was none.
David Warrick, Executive Director of AFSCME 62, spoke to the Board. He is available to answer any questions about AFSCME. He thanked the Board for talking about the collective bargaining resolution, for listening to suggestions, and for the changes the Board made.
Antonia Matthew spoke to the Board. She wasn't at the last board meeting, but through CATS she watched it later. Regarding the business of discarding items that was brought up again, usually people say it's books that aren't being signed out that are discarded. She has a real concern about this and feels one of the missions of the library is to be of service. Whether anyone checks out books or not, the books should be available. She gave an example of The Longest Journey, which she imagined no one had signed this out in decades. She worried that the library might take away books that need to be on the shelves; a record of our literary usage. She recommended that lists could be published of items that are going to be discarded or a group/committee could be organized to review items.
Sara announced that the Friends of the Library are hosting an author event at Buskirk-Chumley with author Luis Alberto Urrea on Friday, November 16. She issued an invitation to everyone to come. Tickets are $15 in advance and $20 at door. The $65 premium ticket includes a reception at the library after the lecture to meet the author.
The meeting adjourned at 6:53pm.
Contact
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Updated:
December 21, 2007
° http://www.monroe.lib.in.us/board/200711min.html
