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Special Libraries Association Boston Chapter
Board Meeting
October 15, 2002
Minutes
Members present: Hope Tillman, Margaret Howe-Soper, Claudette Newhall, Jessica Baumgart, Liz
Peoples, Sandra Peters, Liz Bibby, Mary Chitty, Helen Keil, Tom Clark, Teresa
Frydryk, Leslie Knapp, Kathy McCabe, Bob Moore.
Kathy McCabe called meeting to order at 6:10 p.m.
The minutes of the transition meeting were distributed prior. Aside from some creative misspellings of member's names there were no issues. There was a motion to approve by Liz Bibby, seconded by Tom Clark. Motion approved.
Program Committee Report
Liz distributed a program calendar for 2003. A workshop with the Rhode Island SLA chapter was pushed back because planned speaker Guy St. Clair was unavailable. Registration for the Oct.28th, 'Intellectual Property' program was under-enrolled, with a break-even of 70. Suggestions were made for outreach to law libraries, and posting notices at appropriate colleges. It was noted that the chapter has no policy on attendance minimums for programs. Reasons for considering one: low attendance is discouraging for speakers and supporting vendors, and bad for chapter finances. The Tia's event was well received, pulling in students, and generally a good ice-breaker. Such social events cost the chapter nothing and so are 'low cost-high return', and are good for membership recruitment. Liz requested feedback on a networking social event for January. Lastly, she suggested a date between May 19th - 21st for the Business Meeting, with backup dates of the 12th - 15th, checking for conflicts with college graduation traffic. She asked if location or not having a guest speaker would impact attendance; the consensus was that neither did.
Director of Finance Report
Tom distributed spreadsheets for 2001-2 Final Budget and 2002-3 Proposed Budget. The proposed budget for 2003 is for $34K, with income of $28K and expected deficit of slightly over $6K. Reasons for the deficit include: program costs greater than income and modest vendor sponsorship. Emails were sent to all committees on their budget items. A small plus: there are savings in a number of unspent items last year, i.e. postage for the Bulletin.
A related discussion ensued on expenses such as printing and mailing the bulletin, versus electronic publication. More advertising for the electronic edition would help. It was previously thought to be a sore point with the IRS, but Hope recalled that the issue was based on print, not electronic distribution.
Kathy noted some chapters are electronically distributing both bulletins and program ads. There were ideas on steering the membership towards electronic access for the bulletin, programs, and chapter activities. A goal would be to have all members subscribed to the chapter listserv. The upcoming February videoconference would provide a good experiment in distributing announcements electronically. Perhaps even an option for people to request no more paper mailings.
Scholarships: Margaret Howe-Soper noted that the Affirmative Action Committee Minority scholarship has not been awarded in some time but we had plans to give one and will have expenses.
Treasurer's Report
Leslie noted that interest rates are down by half and that is hurting our accounts. The Operating Budget was around 24K. Noting that the upcoming program is under-registered, Leslie alerted all that the operating budget has never before sunk below 20K.
Membership Report
Sandra distributed a chart on membership with a positive trend. Summer was slow but as of October 15th, chapter membership is 602 members, highest for the year.
Employment Report
Unable to attend, Claire mailed her report. Just seven jobs have been listed since August 16th; the market is extremely slow. Should we cross-post jobs found on other relevant web sites, i.e. MLIN? Kathy favored cross-posting and there was general agreement.
Vendor Support
Liz Peoples announced there were three sponsors for the Intellectual Property program. Raising money from vendors is getting tougher, so she starts calling earlier. ISI expressed interest in support. Buzzy Basch will guarantee costs for Northern Outreach
Logistics Report
Jessica and Claudette distributed draft guidelines on over-subscribed programs and on last-minute cancellations. These issues resulted from past problems. Dealing with over-subscribed meetings has required very fast decisions in the past. Cancellations on short notice require the news be quickly and widely distributed. Claudette and Jessica plan to post the guidelines to the listserv and requested comments by 10/29.
A discussion developed as to whether to accept payment at the door to programs. These have been refused in the past because advance registration is needed to accurately gauge room size. Given that some facilities can respond on short notice with larger or smaller rooms, Kathy suggested accepting pay-at-the-door, perhaps with a surcharge. Jessica noted that there are some chronic repeat 'walk-ins'. The debate ultimately concluded that walk-ins would be dealt with on a case by case, location by location basis, and presumed a surcharge. A second issue concerned accepting credit cards. Historically there were issues involved with registration details and with security, but times have changed. Kathy asked Leslie to revisit credit card payments.
Student Relations Report
Alan Thibeault mailed in his report. 'A group of motivated GSLIS students. . . have decided to take the bull by the horns and re-establish the student group at Simmons.' Dormant for twelve months, the group was considered dissolved. Among their goals are a) supporting the chapter's annual Day on the Job program, b) supporting the Student stipend essay contest c) Sponsoring some program(s) that support SLA (i.e. a speaker or panel discussion). Alan also weighed in the issue of Free Passes/Coupons for Day on the Job participants.
The coupon issue was discussed. Could, for example, a coupon from 'Day on the Job' and one for 'New Member' be combined? Based on past experience, the coupons should have validation (name of the committee member issuing it) and expiration dates: specific dates instead of period of time, and specific amounts as opposed to 'good for a program', as some programs cost significantly more than others. Discussion on precisely what limitations should be put on the coupons was tabled for the next meeting.
Chapter Discussion List
Hope Tillman spoke about issues with managing the Boston Chapter's discussion list. Hope is working to bring order to the list, clearing up duplicate email addresses and identifying non-chapter members. Eighteen people have been currently unsubscribed because they are unidentifiable as members (but can be resubscribed if they ask). [Based in part on notes emailed after the meeting] There are 588 subscribers on the listserv: 113 of these are not members. With regards to future electronic distribution of chapter information, 213 Chapter members (out of 602) are unsubscribed. Hope is contacting them in the hopes of getting them hooked up. Among the List Manager privileges are the power to un-subscribe or add expiration dates to non-members. Hope proposed doing this last to non chapter members, but will let them resubscribe if they ask. Many of these are officers of other chapters, and a lot of former members. Kathy supported expiring non-members. She also asked Hope to distribute email to list subscribers explaining the options of using the web based system to unsubscribe/resubscribe when out of office. The idea of using the list to distribute the Chapter bulletin was raised again. Hope's experience was that in the past many members were upset when they were automatically sent it, and it is time consuming to keep accurate. Suggestion: perhaps start with the list of new members and give them an opt-out. Hope will work with Teresa Frydryk to make sure there is an accurate list of member non list subscribers for Teresa to send the bulletin, to avoid duplicate messages.
Fall Kick-Off Report
Kathy: the 9/5 Kick-off was a big success, even though it lost $319. It being a social event, we didn't do evaluations.
Matarazzo Scholarship: the transition meeting discussed contributing $500 but tabled it for this meeting. Among the issues raised: the chapter hasn't yet awarded its annual minority scholarship, so this was seen as a competitor. Still, this request was a one-time issue. Leslie noted that Simmons College was requesting $1000. It was concluded that, Jim Matarrazzo having made a tremendous contribution to the Chapter, the scholarship request was appropriate. Hope made a motion for a $1000 contribution, Teresa seconded: the vote was unanimous.
Next board meeting TBA. Meeting concluded at 8:05 p.m.
Bob Moore
Secretary
Past minutes:
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Executive Board Meeting Minutes
SLA
SLA-Boston