Home › Forums › Council › Council Meeting Minutes

Council 1/20/10

Thu, 01/28/2010 - 16:43 — admin

January 20, 2010
Council Meeting

Facilitator: Stephanie Spurlock
Secretary: Chip Kruthoffer
Present: All

Patron Input
Carol reported further incidents of patron confusion over the 6 day hold period for reserves, and wondered if we should still try to communicate the change in procedure via statements on receipts or other methods. Discussion ensued. The consensus was that the change has been in effect so long that there was concern about publicity doing more harm than good at this point.

Staff Input
Stephanie presented a marketing idea from FFB staff about informing patrons of the value of the items and services we provide. For example, 3 books @ $20 ea + 2 DVDs @ $10 ea. = $80 of value. Carrie replied that we do make a similar effort at the Reality Check programs for teens already. At one time we had the info from http://9libraries.info/ on the public site, but this information is a bit dated now. All agreed that this was a good idea to explore further. PR Dept. will pursue creating displays in each of the branches with this theme.
 

Old Business

Miss Essman announced that Community Chairs for the levy campaign will be Steve and Prue Dana (Oxford), Gregg Stagg (Fairfield), and John and Susan Vaughn. Dave Belew will serve as the the Campaign Chair. Don Stewart will serve as the Treasurer.

Gale and Rob discussed new policies regarding background checks for new hires. Effective immediately, the Butler County Clerk of Courts will run a criminal background check on all potential new hires, and the Bureau of Motor Vehicles will run a report on all potential new hires who will be driving our vehicles. These requirements will extend the hiring timeline an extra 7-10 days, so supervisors should account for this when interviewing, scheduling and making hiring decisions.

New Business

Miss Essman relayed information about a statewide survey of patrons and library computer use:

As part of a process to prepare a statewide application to obtain federal stimulus funding that would benefit Ohio public libraries, Connect Ohio is conducting surveys to gather additional data about the public computers in libraries and how they are used. OPLIN strongly encourages every library to participate in this process; the data gathered will be very valuable in many ways beyond its use in the stimulus funding application. Please see the survey support materials at  http://www.oplin.org/connect-ohio-library-and-patron-surveys.
The library survey itself can be found at  http://www.connectohio.org/public_library_survey/. Please complete the survey by January 29 -- and thank you very much for your assistance!
Stephen Hedges, Director,  Ohio Public Library Information Network (OPLIN)

 

Chip will complete the library portion. PR will distribute publicity materials for display on the public computing areas of each location. Public participants are eligible to win a drawing for one of 12 netbook computers provided by Connect Ohio.

Other

Gratia announced the 2010 Caldecott winners and mentioned that our children's fiction circulation has experienced only a modest decline. The Twilight and Diary of a Wimpy Kid series were most popular.

Carol mentioned that with the Public Library of Dayton and Montgomery County dropping out of MORE, staff are having more difficulty locating materials eligible to borrow.

Next Meeting: February 17, 2010

Facilitator: Gale Logan

Secretary; Stephanie Spurlock

‹ Council 2/17/10 Council 12/16/09 ›