library of california
Planning Region VII
Ventura + Santa Barbara + San Luis Obispo
Corrected and approved by Core Planning Group 2/24/2000.
REGION VII CORE PLANNING GROUP
JANUARY 27, 2000
CHAIR: David Dowell Cuesta College
ATTENDEES: Patricia Allaback Cate School
Leslie Bretall College of the Canyons
Joanne Kennedy St. John’s Regional Medical Library
Starrett Kreissman Ventura County Library
John Murray Westmont College
Sandy Neder Pleasant Valley School
Sarah Pritchard University of California Santa Barbara
Judith Segel Black Gold Cooperative Library System
Octavio Sifuentes Ventura College
Bill Stokes Santa Maria Bonita School District
Nina Taylor Lompoc Public Library
Bryan Thompson Naval Facilities Engineering Service Center
CALL TO ORDER 1:00 p.m. by David Dowell, Presiding, at Ventura County Library, Foster Branch.
1. ADOPTION OF AGENDA
The Agenda was adopted as printed.
2. APPROVAL OF MINUTES OF DECEMBER 16, 1999
The minutes were accepted as posted on the Region VII web page.
3. REPORTS
a. STATE LIBRARY
i. Email, January 10, 2000, from Diana Paque re supplemental funding requests. As much as possible, funds should go toward services, rather than toward administrative costs. Funds will be allocated during the current fiscal year, following approval by the Board at either their February or April 2000 meeting.
ii. Email, January 3, 2000, from Diana Paque responding to issues raised at the December 16, 1999, Core Planning Group meeting at the Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History. Treat charter schools separately since they have independent fiscal responsibility. CA State Library staff is developing a pilot for purchasing databases initially by the regions. Mark Parker and Ira Bray are mapping out an action plan. Diana expects to have the steps and a time frame for network applications at the January 28, 2000 meeting in Sacramento. Diana also said she is looking into coordinated press releases.
iii. Telephone call with Bessie Condos Tichauer – Judith Segel. Diana Paque, Mary Purucker (Library of CA Board member) and Bessie met with Barbara Jeffers and the present, past and future chairs of the California School Library Association. The meeting participants agreed that the school library people will prepare a guideline document for the regions about what constitutes professional status for school librarians. Since this is an issue for special libraries too, they hope the school guideline will be a model that can be generalized. Bessie felt positive about the meeting. More meetings will follow.
Comment from CPG member: There’s some state-level urging to get credentialing and better skills and education for school librarians and others, but it is not strident.
b. LETTER TO JAMES DAWE, President, Library of California Board, regarding Funding - Starrett Kreissman. The letter requests information about lobbying plans for Library of California funding, contingency plans if funding is not approved, and what the region can do to help. Suggestions as to how to improve the letter were made, mostly format changes to emphasize the major points of the letter. Starrett Kreissman will revise the letter, which she and Brian Reynolds originally wrote, and which was forwarded to David Dowell by Jean Scully. A motion was made, seconded, and carried that the Core Planning Group send the letter, revised according to the discussion, to Mr. Dawe over David Dowell’s signature as chair of Region VII.
c. GOVERNOR’S BUDGET MESSAGE - Email dated January 10, 2000 to System Coordinators re the Governor’s Budget from Liz and Diana: Both the Governor’s office and the Department of Finance are very interested in supporting the Library of California; however, they want more evidence of need before they support the $28 million increase in the budget. The supplemental planning grant applications will help to clarify how the money will be spent.
d. GRANTS: David Dowell and Starrett Kreissman will get a preliminary idea about funding for requested grants at the meeting they will attend January 28, 2000 in Sacramento. Diana Paque’s response to some preliminary information at the Santa Barbara focus group meeting, 1/20/2000, was positive and she thought the amount requested was reasonable. All the grant applications are on the web; go through the Agenda for today’s meeting to find them. There is a chart showing the budget at the end of each application. Soon, the grants will be accessible from the Gold Coast Web Page index. Many of the funds are in-kind funds: time spent traveling, reviewing ideas, etc. The hourly rate for in-kind funds is a rough guess because there was not enough time to consult other Core Planning Group members regarding the rate. A ballot listing the grants and the requested amounts for each project was passed out. David Dowell asked each attendee to rank the projects in order of priority, so that he and Starrett Kreissman would have that information to take to the January 28, 2000, meeting in Sacramento.
Diana Paque has been asked to set deadlines for Library of California documents such as grant applications, reports, etc., as “postmarked by” dates rather than “due in Sacramento at 4 p.m. on a date”. This change would be beneficial for those of us located far from Sacramento. She may provide us with suggestions as to how to improve the Region VII applications. Diana is planning to present the grant applications from the eight regions at the January 28, 2000, meeting in Sacramento. The meeting will include a legal discussion, funding and budget issues, supplemental funding, and a report from representatives of each region. David Dowell and Starrett Kreissman will attend for Region VII.
SUPPLEMENTAL FUNDING GRANTS APPLIED FOR BY REGION VII (See page 3 of the Region VII Newsletter for further information, or access the complete applications on the web through the January 27, 2000, Core Planning Group Agenda.)
i. Marketing – David Dowell. Irene Hoffman did most of the work on this project. It would be using software that Cal Poly already uses, and is basically an effort to increase communication and network development, as well as to further public relations.
ii. Online Database – Starrett Kreissman. The Gale Biography Resource was requested for all members in Region VII.
iii. Video Conferencing – Octavio Sifuentes, John Murray, and Myra Nicholas. John Murray: Region VII wants to obtain video conferencing equipment and provide for training. Although most community colleges and universities have this equipment, they are first in line to use this equipment. Others would not have the opportunity to use it. The grant requests one video-conferencing center per county in Region VII, thus eliminating the need to travel as far for Core Planning Group meetings. Costs include technicians and possibly paying for the site. It’s important to have good technical support.
iv. Automating small libraries with unique collections. Patty Allaback, John Murray and Sarah Pritchard. There are great collections in some special or unique libraries that are not at all ready to link electronically. The project would be to identify and support up to six libraries for a year, at which time their institutions would agree to take over. The estimated cost for each library is $25,000 to $50,000. A consultant would help the libraries do the automation. Funds could also play for hardware, wiring, software, or all three.
v. Training Workshops – Judith Segel developed this project with Terri Sheridan. The intent is to make the library staff more knowledgeable. The request is for $18,000 in Library of California funds to pay for fifteen sessions at $1,000 each, with office supplies, accounting, and auditing. The in-kind contribution would be $47,000.
The State is interested in Z39.50 training, which relates to linking. To make a collection available to others through this system, a library would need a trained person to be compliant. However, training is not needed to use the system to check other collections.
vi. Conference Scholarships –Carol Keator and Judith Segel. The scholarships would cover registration fees and room and board, at about $1,000 per conference, for specific individuals based on their skill levels and needs.
vii. Analysis of Electronic Status – John Murray, Sarah Pritchard, Patty Allaback. An attempt to determine who is ready for what, and who needs what. The consultant(s) needs to be able to give good advice to take libraries to the next step. It was suggested that we provide a list of consultants at network headquarters. There could be a database to assist libraries in choosing the right consultant, based on experience.
viii. Linking the Multi-type Network – Sarah Pritchard, John Murray, Patty Allaback. How do we know what each collection contains? The project would put together a central mechanism that would allow libraries to search each other’s collections. The project is not intended to include direct checkout. It would develop a linking mechanism to allow a cross-search, without going into the different systems, and then initiate an interlibrary loan request. The process would work even if the libraries are using different systems. It can be compared to North Bay Super Search. The base fee is estimated at $500,000, with additional funds for different libraries. The project could take more time for some databases, depending on their condition at the start of the project. Sarah suggested that it would be helpful to know which vendors are available and what would be required. David Dowell commented that there is more traffic if a patron can directly place an interlibrary loan, although often the library actually has the material the patron wants, if the library staff is involved. Joanne Kennedy noted that in medical libraries, there is a database for the different medical libraries, through the National Library of Medicine.
e. FOCUS MEETINGS
i. Ventura County Focus Meeting – Starrett Kreissman. The meeting was co-hosted by Joanie Galang and Barbara Murray. There were eleven people in attendance, several of whom had never heard of the Library of California. There was a lot of material to cover in an hour, and lots of questions were asked.
ii. Santa Barbara County Focus Meeting – Sarah Pritchard. Three or four very interested people attended who were not already involved in Library of California. A large mailing had been done for the southern part of the county. The transition survey was passed out. Sarah suggested tapping librarians without a present job to work on committees. Diana Paque and Bessie Condos-Tichauer attended this meeting.
iii. San Luis Obispo County LEAPS Meeting – Bill Stokes. Marylou from Cal Poly has been trying to get electronic library classes from San Jose at Cal Poly. Such classes meet once a month. David Dowell said that Cuesta College will have an electronic introductory library course, which requires only one meeting on campus. They are hoping to offer at least one course per semester.
f. SUBCOMMITTEES
i. Bylaws – Octavio Sifuentes. Octavio provided a handout outlining some of the legal structure set up in the bylaws template received from the State Library. Included are the Gold Coast Region Council, the Gold Coast Region Board of Directors, corporate officers, and sub-groups, committees and advisory bodies. Octavio explained that under the Bylaws template, the corporate officers are hired by the Board of Directors or the Council and can be employees of the corporation. Members of the Board of Directors can also be employees of the corporation. The Core Planning Group does not see hired officers as appropriate for Region VII.
David Dowell - The Council is more of a legislative body and the Board of Directors is more of an administrative body. We need to constitute the Board. Any institution that joins is on the Council. A school board would be represented, but not each school in the district. The same would hold true for a library group; the group would be represented, but not each small component. The Council will meet one to four times per year. The Board of Directors will meet more often, perhaps once a month. The Council will be too large to meet often and shouldn’t have a large number required for a quorum, as it will probably be difficult to meet the required attendance.
David Dowell and Octavio Sifuentes will work together on structure under the Bylaws. Jeanne Callahan, JD, will be a resource.
ii. Communication – Myra Nicholas, chair. Judith Segel spoke, in Myra’s absence.
The first issue of the Region VII Newsletter was sent to more than 700 libraries. In the next newsletter there will be a response card with space to indicate whether libraries want to continue to receive the newsletter. The newsletter was written by Jeanne Callahan, with guidance and assistance from Judith Segel and Myra Nicholas.
Web Site Revamp: Web designer Anne Cundiff turned over electronic copies of the files for the new web site architecture on Tuesday, 1/25/2000. The new index will make the web material more accessible than previously. J. Segel will send a notice via the listserv when the index is available. Let her know if there’s a problem with the web site. Minor problems can be fixed without further charge. We can also fund a few changes from the original allocation for this project if necessary.
iii. Transition of Services – Jean Scully, chair. Sarah Pritchard reported, in Jean’s absence. The committee is making a last attempt via the focus group meetings to obtain input from the potential member community before writing the transition plan. They are working on key services and key goals.
iv. Membership – Patty Allaback. The issue of member qualifications, especially for schools, has not been resolved. The State Library is willing to make allowances; there are ways of accommodating certain members. Patty will put in writing the items under discussion in the committee regarding qualifying for membership. A definition of what constitutes sharing resources (an institution has to make its collection accessible in some way, but it doesn’t have to be in a way that is unavailable to its own patrons) is still needed. Patty will make some notes on this, but other Core Planning Group members should assist with the definition.
David Dowell – Although every member institution will be represented on the Council, we can limit representation on the Board, for instance, to one private school and one public school.
4. TASK ASSIGNMENTS AND DEADLINES Postponed to February meeting.
5. LIBRARY OF CALIFORNIA BOARD MEETING IN SANTA BARBARA, June 21 & 22. Postponed to February meeting.
6. GENERAL AWARENESS EVENTS AND CONTACTS No discussion.
7. OTHER BUSINESS No discussion.
8. AGENDA BUILDING: Next meeting: Thursday, February 24, 2000, 1:00 p.m., UCSB, Goleta. Sarah Pritchard will give Judith Segel parking information for the next meeting, which will be held at UCSB, Davidson Library (the main library), in the Cheadle Room on the third floor.
a. Task Assignments and Deadlines for bylaws, long-range plan of service, budget and completion of the application carried forward to February.
b. Library of California Board Meeting, June 21 & 22 in Santa Barbara. Will Region VII sponsor an event for the Board? Carried forward to February.
ADJOURNMENT
Meeting adjourned at 3:15 p.m. Recorded by Jeanne Callahan