Executive Board Meeting - Wyoming Library Association
Draft
2/12/2004
Laramie County Library

Present: Patty Patterson, Troy Rumpf, Lesley Boughton, Lalia Jagers, Laura Grott, Cynthia Twing, Erin Kinney, Carol Brown, Debbie Schlinger, Marylou Bowles-Banks, Jim Connor ALTA, Susan Cuthbertson, Carey Hartmann, Deb Kelly, Diana Oedekoven, and Jennifer Mayer.

President Carey Hartman called the meeting to order at 1:05pm. Susan Cuthbertson declared a quorum. Carey made some changes to the agenda.

Carey introduced Jim Connor from the American Library Trustee Association (ALTA) from Arvada, CO. He travels five states and said they are there to help us.

REPORTS:

President's report was sent out in the meeting packet (attached).

Treasurer's report: total cash and bank accounts $80,980.69 as of 12/31/03. Cash available for general use at years end was $75,264.35. There were some errors noted from the audit committee. Those errors will be corrected and then posted on the website. Laura commented that some procedures would need to be changed regarding the audit. (Corrected reports attached: Balance Sheet ; Investment Portfolio)

MPLA: Patty said she had nothing to add to her report in the packet. (Attached)

State Library report: Lesley Boughton said the Wyoming State Library has official notice that they will receive an additional $138,000 of LSTA appropriations for two years. We are currently receiving $560,000.

Maggie Scarlet from Jackson was appointed to the Institute of Museum and Library Service (IMLS) board. This is a national appointment and very good for Wyoming. Maggie has been very active with the Buffalo Bill Historical Center in Cody, but is not as up to speed on libraries.

Legislative report: At this point the Wyoming State Libraries request for funds for databases is still in the budget.

SECTION REPORTS:

Children's: Deb Bruse was sick. She sent word via email to pass on that the section voted to do the nation-wide Summer Reading program. Through LSTA grants two representatives from WY will attend the conference. Children's section will pick up the remaining cost.

Government: Carol Brown turned in a written report. (Attached)

Para/Professional: Lalia Jagers reported they would try to do a joint section meeting with the Public Library section June 4 or 11.

Public: Janet Meury was sick, Patty Patterson reported the joint meeting would be in Casper. Janet and Sukey are working on the Author's Night for WLA 2004.

School Library/Media: Marylou Bowles-Banks said we are all advocates for libraries. They haven't done their by/laws yet. She asked where the money comes from for speakers for their meetings.

Academic: Diane Odekoven had no report; there will not be a section meeting this year. The Academic/Special Library section agreed to hold spring section meeting every other year.

Awards and Grants: Erin Kinney said the committee is ready to go.

Communications: Troy Rumpf said he has a full committee.

Constitution and By-Laws: Kathy Carlson will chair this committee.

Intellectual Freedom: Patty Meyers is the chair.

Legislative: Cynthia Twing said Lucie Osborn would give the Legislative update at 4:30 today. The committee plans to visit each county library board in March through April to sign a resolution of support for a bill on creating library districts.

Membership: no report

Mentoring: no report

Nominations and Election: Karen Lange is chair. Jan Segerstrom has already accepted the nomination for Vice Chair/Chair Elect. The committee is seeking another candidate to commit to running. The intent is to ensure both candidates have information regarding decisions being made about the 2005 joint WLA/MPLA conference planning. The larger, joint conference is requiring earlier planning and decision-making.

Revenue: Paul Holland is the chair and he was sick. Our investment plan needs updated and they will discuss creating more clear guidelines for expending funds once investment goals are producing expendable funds.

Buckaroo, Indian Paintbrush, Soaring Eagle: Carey reported that the WY Reading Council (WRC) would no longer be having a conference on their own. They will have members attend the School Improvement Conference that is planned by the Wyoming State Department of Education. The WRC will be responsible for exhibitors and will use this as their fundraiser. They will continue to have a co-chair and committee members for the book awards committee.

ALA: Jennifer Mayer submitted a written report. (Attached)

OLD BUSINESS

Debbie is working hard on the 2004 conference. The theme is "Library Excellence - Get jazzed at WLA - Enrichment, Empowerment, Enthusiasm". Conference will be Wed. Oct 13 through Sat. Oct 16. The committee is thinking about a Gates Grant for technology for post-conference on Saturday - this would mean no charge for participants. The pre- conference will be Mary Shippey and working with different generations; unless a grant is obtained, participants will be charged for the pre-conference. Friday night a CA cuisine is planned including Librarians and Libraries in the movies. Wed. night will be the Author night with fewer authors this year, and may include the vendors then go to the college for the authors.

Carey gave these suggestions for conference - we need more time at opening for association business meeting. Chris Van Burgh suggested to Carey that ribbons be made for nametags of those who have attended the Leadership Institute.

Exhibitor's information will go out soon and Laura Grott asked if we wanted to raise the fee for a table at 2004 conference from $285 or leave it where it is. Discussion followed and it was decided to leave it where it is.

2005 conference will be in Jackson. Dail Barbour is the local contact. We will pay one half and they will pay one half the fee by April 2004 to hold Snow King. At the end of conference everything will divided up according to the percentage attending from each association.

Erin and Scott Kinney set up and maintain our web site. We are only paying for the costs of domain name and connectivity.

Debbie Schlinger moved that we pay Erin and Scott $300 annually for the use of software and hardware for our webpage design/work. Lalia Jagers seconded. The motion carried.

It was explained we are a 501(c)6 not a 501(c)3 because we pay a lobbyist. That means we cannot apply for McMurry monies because donations we make to WLA are not tax deductible. We have to do income tax and the larger our net worth and grants are the more difficult it is to do. Laura currently does our income tax, but is not comfortable continuing. Leslie suggested we think about hiring a professional to do our income tax. A professional audit done every five years was also discussed.

Lalia Jagers moved to have the WLA income taxes professionally submitted by an accounting firm and the association have an audit done for 2004 and then every five years there after. Jennifer Mayer seconded. Motion carried. A summary of the strategic plan was distributed to all via email in December 2003. Carey Hartmann met with Troy Rumpf, Communication Chair, Tina Lackey, WSL Public Relations and Marketing Specialist and Erin Kinney, Awards Chair, to discuss the marketing aspect of the strategic plan. Further work needs to be done regarding marketing, branding our selves, and getting the word out to our users. It was decided that the barriers committee was not a necessity at this point and that the Communications Committee, with input from Tina and relevant WLA committee chairs will continue work on this piece of the strategic plan. They will work to find out what services we are provided with WLA and what we should be providing.

Debbie said it is vital for the WLA membership to know what was discussed at the strategic planning workshop. Carey is working on getting it on the website.

Carey also met with Lesely Boughton, Wyoming State Librarian. They discussed the strategic direction of better alignment between WLA and the WSL. WSL creates the Outrider that discusses a variety of library news events from around the state. The WLA newsletter that is put out twice a year is really just a vehicle for membership renewal and conference registration. Leslie Boughton and Carey Hartmann announced the State Library is bringing back the newsletter Roundup. It will be a joint product of WSL, the Center of the Book, and WLA. Published quarterly the Roundup will be free to all WLA members, and distributed to all state libraries in the nation. We are encouraged to send ideas/suggestions of what we want in it to Troy Rumpf or Tina Lackey.

The WSL is negotiating with Peggy Barber and Linda Wallace, nationally known experts on library marketing and PR, to come to WY to do focus work on the elements of a marketing campaign. WSL and WLA key players will be part of this workshop.

Carey also met with Chris Van Burgh, Trish Palluck and Jill Rourke to discuss developing a leadership track for WLA members. Chris stressed the importance of looking at all the positive things we have in place regarding this process, such as the leadership institute, mentoring events at conference, Nora Van Burgh development grants, McMurry Library Endowment fund and LSTA grants for individuals. In discussion it was mentioned there is controversy about the continuing education plan relating to the Salt Lake certification program because there is no plan for library certification in Wyoming at this point. Suggestions must come from the library community not the state Library if this is a direction we want to go. WLA members need to be polled on this issue. The mentoring committee is currently ad-hoc and Carey hopes it will become a permanent committee.

Another piece of strategic direction that needs to address is how do we move the WLA Executive Board from a reporting board to a problem solving board. With out this shift it will be more difficult for the organization to move forward. The first step in this will be getting information out to the board prior to the meeting so that they have time to think gather information and think about decisions and areas of discussion.

NEW BUSINESS

Erin and Scott are experimenting with putting the full directory online and having it password protected. The first use of this will be to ask people to up-date information and choose what information they want to appear there. The dues form needs to be updated to include a disclaimer stating that dues to WLA are not tax deductible.

Marylou moved that Laura be authorized to investigate the feasibility of purchasing the Merchant Services hardware and software for easier processing of credit cards, and contingent upon her findings that she and Carey expedite the purchase. Carol Brown seconded motion. Motion carried.

Troy asked for clarification of the Communication Committee responsibilities. He specifically is looking for the committee to be the official liaison with media regarding WLA activities.

Patty asked what we are supposed to keep in our blue notebooks. Carey said to keep two years of minutes and an up-to-date budget.

Having no other business we adjourned at 3:55pm.

Deb Kelly
Serials, Interlibrary Loans and Government Documents