Advisory Council Meeting, August 14, 2002
Dolby Labs
Minutes

Advisory Council Meeting

8/14/02

Dolby Labs

Attending: Bonnie Willdorf, Maggie O’Brien, Tamara Horacek, Nancy Adams, Beth Graham, Jaye Lapachet, Terry Richards, Sara O’Keefe, Gina Castro, Rita Evans, Camille Reynolds, Mary Keba, John Gallwey, Barbara Janis, Lauri Flynn

Called to order at 5:50 pm

1. Tamara welcomed all in attendance.
2. The meeting minutes of February 21, 2002 were amended as follows Scott McNeally, Brian Quigley, spelling of Dialog, Gina not Regina, Michael Chabon. The minutes were approved as amended.
3. The meeting minutes of June 26 were amended as follows: June 27 not June 26. The minutes were approved as amended.
4. The meeting minutes of June 27 were amended as follows: no ? on item 4, item 13c Headquarters not National, item 14 headquarters not national, item18 Headquarters not National. The minutes were approved as amended.
5. Treasurer’s Report – Nancy -- beginning balance $14,106.91 (as of July 1) and ending balance $14,039.43 (as of yesterday). The last few Jobline checks will be coming in and a deposit was made for the September meeting. Pooled account fund is about $30,000, not accounted for in this Treasurer’s Report.
6. Finance Report – Sara – We are expecting about $6500 from Headquarters for our share of membership fees. Blank expense lines are either from people she hasn’t heard from or people who don’t know yet. Tours will be $400 income and $700 expenses. Y means there is a response but no request, such as Secretary. Maybe it should be N/A instead of Y. Bonnie added that there should be a line item for International Relations for membership for two years at $110.00/year. Tamara said that there may be a directory cost as well but we will be discussing that later this evening. Jaye questioned the Program expenses as high. It is actually OK since there are two different accounts in one – program for the membership and program for the committee. Tamara announced that there will be a finance meeting in January for a mid-year review to make sure we’re on track – the Executive Board will be invited and anyone else who wants to come is welcome.
7. Mentoring assignments were discussed. This is an opportunity for mentees to ask questions – please feel free to ask about anything, Ask Tamara and Beth as well. Everyone is invited to the Executive Board meetings as well. Please contact your mentees before meetings – call if you can’t get a response by email. All we need is a couple of lines for a report. This is a proactive role for the mentor.
8. Tamara read part of Bill Fisher’s hand-written welcoming note. Tamara suggested that we could invite him to our meetings and Cindy Hill as well. Maggie said that a formal invitation would be for them to speak, but we should have an open invitation for them to attend. Both the President and President-Elect are members of our chapter and the San Andreas Chapter. Rita mentioned that the SF and San Andreas chapters have great representation on the Board. Ten years ago we had no one at the association level.
9. Tamara announced that Steve Cooney will have the current issue to the printer this weekend and the next deadline is October 4.
10. Tamara announced that the Executive Board met with the San Andreas Board last week. Three issues were discussed.

• San Andreas agreed in principle to the directory proposal except for one issue – they want to have an electronic version available someplace other than at the SLA Headquarters site. The privacy issue is a problem. But there are problems with the SLA site. We are going to try and have a proposal ready by September 10 (San Andreas’ next meeting) for a password-protected directory on the San Andreas site. A discussion ensued about the proposal put forward by our committee*. There are still issues about printing it and the different points of access. The only additional index we now have is the organizational index. The directory would be available in PDF format and the joint meeting stressed that there should be someone available to help with printing by phone. The cost is so high for printing and we are facing a $6000 deficit. Sponsorship and advertising are very difficult to obtain. There are some people who are unable to print out large PDF files. Bruce has facilities to print out a few, but not many copies. Terry felt that a small fee might be an acceptable issue for some, and Maggie suggested that Kinko’s is a viable alternative for printing. There was a discussion about the issue of paying even a nominal fee for the directory, particularly since SLA is a membership organization. Nancy suggested that we market it as a great new service. Terry raised it as a membership involvement issue. Bonnie raised the issue of currency. Beth felt that not getting a directory appears to be cheap, because it is so difficult to access the SLA site to find contact information. Jaye mentioned that Dialog might be willing to underwrite a printed directory or a portion of it for those who wish a printed copy. Rita feels that an electronic directory is totally appropriate in 2002. The suggestion was made that a read-only PDF file could be posted on a hidden link to be sent to the members. This must be cleared with Headquarters. Maggie questioned how often the PDF would be refreshed. The question of posting the proposal to the discussion list was brought up and it was decided to post it once it is more complete and with a FAQ as well that would anticipate the questions. Jaye suggested that the FAQ be posted to the Web site. Bruce and Gretchen will try to have something together by September 10. Rita noted after the meeting that the mailing (not printing, just mailing) cost for a single copy of the directory when she was Membership Chair five years ago was $3.00.

• Jobline transition – San Andreas has taken the Jobline over for the next two years. Unfortunately that will impact our revenue, but the transition has been completed and we are pleased.

• Assessment and Benchmarking Institute in Monterey sponsored by SLA – San Andreas will be hosting a dine-around.

Old Business

1. Twinning Program – Bonnie -- nothing to report
2. Leadership Training – Maggie – nothing yet scheduled– Maggie asked for suggestions – this is a free "thank-you" program for chapter leadership

Committee Reports

• Academic Relations – Tamara said that Jenny Kanji is planning a Career Day at SIMS sometime in November
• Advertising – Mary – moving along smoothly – about 8 in this Bayline – some of the old faithfuls and a few new ones
• Archives -- John --nothing to report
• Bulletin – already reported
• Consultation – Barbara – no one has called – Tamara suggested that Barbara call Linda Broussard at Headquarters for suggestions – Headquarters has a lot to say about consulting – Ann Abate has a lot of good information – Bonnie said that when she was consulting she basically told people to hire librarians, but not to conflict with paid consultants or recommend them either. Terry suggested that we post something on the Web site and Lauri suggested that we put something in the Business Times advertising this service. There are multiple business newspapers to post to.
• Discussion List Administrator – Tamara said the Deb Hunt reported that there are 125 regular subscribers and 64 digest subscribers.
• Fundraising – Robert Burke has three sponsors for the September dinner meeting and a possible fourth.
• Membership – Beth – nothing to report
• Program – Jaye – Mary, our hospitality saint, got us into Yank Sing. September meeting coming along. Subscription info went out. One question that came up was whether retirees and students would get a deeper discount. Maggie suggested that we give it a try with no exceptions since we are doing this for the first time this year. Maggie said that Marlene Vogelsang suggested that the announcement go on the Web site, and also that it might be helpful to announce the speakers and specific dates be on the form as well. Brian Quigley is taking checks for the subscription as well as the meeting.
• Government Relations – Lauri reported that Tasha Bergson-Michelson said she has submitted a small budget request. She would like to publicize any library-related issues that are being addressed by congress with a table at a dinner meeting with handouts following SLA guidelines.
• Hospitality – Tamara reported that Lincoln Cushing said that Mary is a maven and he is looking forward to working on the hospitality issues now that he has returned from vacation.
• Networking – Camille – open to suggestions – she is on all the listservs and will send things out. Jaye suggested that Camille and Lauri should work together, because Lauri is responsible forfinding events to add to the calendar.
• Professional Development – Gina reported that they have had their first meeting and are batting around several ideas including a program with BayNet in the Spring
• Strategic Planning – Rita – there will be a membership survey this year
• Tours – Terry – several ideas – Berkeley Public Library, Pac Bell Park, Presidio Trust, CBS MarketWatch, China collection at Lone Mountain – these will be slotted in non-dinner meeting months – probably Berkeley Public Library will be first, in October. Maggie suggested that we could have the Executive Board meeting in conjunction with the tour. There are meeting rooms available. Timing may be difficult. All of the branch librarians would be invited. Tamara said that two tours would be sufficient.
• Web – Tamara reported Nick needs dates from Professional Development and Tours
• Reflector – Bonnie read the following report that was transmitted to her via email from Linda Yamamoto:

"First of all, please let everyone know at the meeting that if they haven't received the emails from me (or know of someone who hasn't) about the meeting subscription plan and the September dinner meeting they should contact me. This time I used the handy new download feature at the SLA site o get the most current email list. However, as usual, there were a lot of typos and I had to deal with a lot of bounced emails. I made my best guess for a lot of them, but I still have about 28 email addresses that don't seem to work (should I send out a general appeal in the next newsletter?). There are currently 437 email addresses in the reflector (out of 517 personal members listed in Who's Who Online).

Also, it would be good to be copied in on any messages to the Directory Chairs regarding new members or changes in email addresses so I can add them to the reflector. As I recall, the President-Elect usually gets this information. If this isn't feasible, the Directory Chairs should let me know of any changes that need to be made to the reflector. The Discussion List Administrator and I share info on bounced emails. It would also be good to know who in the Executive Board will go to bat for a member that is having trouble getting their entry in the SLA database changed. Should I refer people to the Directory Chairs, or the President-Elect, who handles Membership? Or someone else? I've had numerous complaints over the years from members who repeatedly submit changes to their info and yet the changes never appear in the database. Maybe it's been getting better or the process has changed, but it'll still be good to know who to refer problems to. (For instance, as of this writing, Jaye Lapachet's email address is still incorrect, while Jean McKenzie's is now correct, even though they have both notified me that they sent in their corrections in the past few days)."

The next joint Advisory Board/Executive Board meeting will be February 4, 2003.

The meeting was adjourned at 7:30 pm

Executive Board Meeting

8/14/02

Dolby Labs

The next meeting is scheduled for October 29

 *NEW DIRECTORY PROCEDURE PROPOSAL

 With the addition of the New "Who's Who Online Membership Directory" page to the SLA HQ’s web site we would like to propose some changes to our current directory procedure.

The Who’s Who page presents an up-to-date listing of all SLA members. This database is fully searchable (by Name, Company, E-mail address, City, State, Country, Chapter [unit], and committee, or any combination of these) and output may be formatted in a variety of ways ("Printer Friendly", Excel, PDF or comma delimited).

We propose the discontinuation of the directory in its current printed form. A link could be added to our chapter website pointing people to the Who’s Who page. Those who feel they must have a printed directory would be able to print their own in any desired format with custom search parameters. Alternately, the Directory committee could produce a print-on-demand (POD) version tailored to the individual’s needs. We have access to the equipment necessary to produce such directories.

The cost of printing is continuing to rise and corporate sponsorship is falling off. Shipping costs are also rising. Printing and shipping a directory to all chapter members would cost the San Francisco chapter approximately $4,000 this year. There is a feeling that this money could be put to a better use.

With the current job market many people seem to be changing jobs often. This makes the printed directory out-of-date, in many cases before it is in the member’s hands. The Who’s Who page alleviates this problem, provided members update their information with Headquarters. This is now easier then it has been in the past and can be done via HQ’s website, by phone or in writing.

With the addition of the Who’s Who to the SLA’s resources has made the printing of directories redundant and wasteful unless there is a specific need. I feel this need can be adequately addressed by POD directories and at great savings to the chapter. Indeed, POD directories may even generate a small income.

Bruce Thomas, Directory Chair

San Francisco Bay Region Chapter, SLA

June 27, 2002