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HomeMy WebLinkAboutMinutes - Minutes - Library Advisory Board - Meeting Date: 9/17/2009 GLENDALE PUBLIC LIBRARY LIBRARY ADVISORY BOARD MEETING MINUTES Thursday, September 17, 2009 7:00 P.M. Main Library 5959 W. Brown St. Glendale, AZ 85302 Members Present: Others Present: JoAnn Lee, Chairperson Ms. Komemicky, Library & Arts Director Cherie Hudson, Vice Chair Cathy Gorham, Deputy Director of Community Services Katy Bickerstaff Cynthia Burmeister, Secretary/Glendale Public Library Sandi Burr Camille Donley Char Sharp Allison Tedford Kenneth Wixon CALL TO ORDER Ms. Lee, Chairperson, called the meeting to order at 6:58 p.m. INTRODUCTION OF NEW BOARD MEMBERS/GUESTS Ms. Lee welcomed everyone after the summer break and introduced the two new Library Advisory Board members, Allison Tedford, At-Large Teen Board member representing the Cholla District and Charlene "Char" Sharp representing the Sahuaro District. Allison and Char each gave a brief introduction. Ms. Komernicky introduced Cathy Gorham, Acting Deputy City Manager for the Community Services group. Cathy gave a brief introduction, touching on her fifteen years with the City of Glendale, twenty three years with local government and her involvement with the Community Services group. Ms. Komernicky introduced Cynthia Burmeister, Secretary for the Glendale Main Library. Cynthia replaced Lenore Tancke in Administrative Services. APPROVAL OF MINUTES Ms. Lee spoke of the Boards and Commissions training given the previous evening and was impressed to see four advisory board members present. She reiterated the importance that meeting minutes be reviewed for amending or approving prior to the upcoming board meeting. Members should be familiar with the agenda and be prepared for discussion. Any discussion made is for the good of the community. Ms. Sharp and Ms. Donley were in agreement. Ms. Lee requested a motion to approve the minutes of the meeting held May 21, 2009. A motion to approve was made by Ms. Sharp. The motion was seconded by Ms. Tedford. LIBRARY REORGANIZATION Ms. Komernicky discussed the reorganization of all three Glendale libraries to accommodate the loss of retirees and other temporary employee losses. Staff has come up with fresh ideas and a willingness to expand on duties to lessen the impact of the vacated positions. Ms. Komernicky gave a PowerPoint presentation to help members visualize the movement within all three locations. Highlights include: o Combining all library pages into one group rather than having dedicated staff for each individual department at Main Library. o Moving staff from other libraries to accommodate losses at Main Library o Relocate the couriers under the Administrative Services department. o In addition to losses, one employee was called for Military Duty. o Hours of operation have decreased to 64 hours at the Foothills Branch and to 58 hours at Velma Teague. The Main Library continues to operate at 69 hours. Ms. Lee asked about the Public Service Assistants. Ms. Komernicky explained that the Circulation Clerks were renamed Public Service Assistants as their duties now required mobility away from the desk and out onto the floor assisting citizens. Ms. Donley asked if employees were being compensated within their new roles with additional/different duties. Ms. Komernicky stated that some shifts were lateral and the others she is working with the Human Resources Department. Mr. Wixon asked how many employees were lost. Ms. Komernicky said that the Library and Arts Department lost a total of 13. 5 positions, 12.5 lost from the Library and one from the Arts Department. Ms. Burmeister replaced Lenore Tancke which reduced this count to 12.5. Additionally, seventeen temporary positions were lost in the library. Ms. Komernicky stated that because the library had an older work force and many close to retirement, she knew that in the years ahead she would be losing employees even before the economic downturn. Ms. Komernicky announced that the libraries had one hundred eleven teens volunteer this summer. They were a great asset to the system during these changing times. Now that they have returned to school, the library staff greatly misses them. Operating hours of the drive up window at Foothills have been reduced. The Drive Up window is operated by volunteers and many leave for the summer months and typically return in the fall. Staff has relocated volunteers to other areas to help with specific demands. Ms. Burr inquired about the creator of the PowerPoint presentation. Ms. Komernicky said that it is our IT supervisor, Marc Grayson who created the Power point. Ms. Lee inquired as to if and how much training employees received as they took on new duties. Ms. Komernicky said that some had been mentored before the reorganization, giving them background knowledge for their new duties. Others received on-the-job training, working with those that were retiring, as they were transitioned into their new positions. All employees had worked in our libraries so they had an extensive knowledge of how libraries operate. All employees appear to be excited and happy about the changes. FAVORITE BOOKS Ms. Komernicky asked if members had received the favorite book recommendations from their council members as was suggested by Ms Burr at the May meeting. Ms. Lee is is working with the Mayor's office Ms. Hudson is also working on getting council member Clark's choices. Ms. Burr suggested spreading out the publicity and advertising featuring two books per month. Ms. Komernicky asked if a wall display or gondola would be preferred for display. Ms. Bun felt that the gondola would be nice. LEAGUE OF CITIES & TOWNS 2010 RESOLUTION Ms. Komernicky presented a background and history of the reciprocal borrowing program, leading into her presentation of the Resolution#20. The towns of Oro Valley and Marana, City of Phoenix, City of Kingman, & City of Peoria have submitted a League of Arizona Cities and Towns 2010 Resolution, urging the State legislature to adopt legislation authorizing cities and towns to form municipal library special taxing districts and to opt out of the county library districts. The town of Oro Valley has since pulled the resolution for further discussion. Glendale does not participate in reciprocal borrowing, but does receive some databases from the County. This year however, the County substituted databases and cut the number of databases that libraries previously received without any input from the libraries. Additionally, when participating libraries received their forms for renewing the reciprocal borrowing the amount of money they were reimbursed dropped from $29.00 to $26.00. Because of this issue and the database issue, meetings have been set with the County and libraries in Maricopa County through Maricopa Association of Governments (MAG). Mr. Wixon asked who would set the tax amount. Ms. Komernicky felt it would be the city, but was not sure as that part had not been formulated; however, since it was pulled it is unclear if it will come back as an issue again. Ms. Bickerstaff wanted to know what the justification was in not reimbursing cities for the full amount paid in by residents. Ms. Komernicky stated that the program was set up in the 1980's and that the county library tax was established for Maricopa County Library District. Ms. Lee felt that if this program was imposed by the county, it would be paid out as county sees fit. Ms. Burr stated that Peoria did not have a library at the time and residents would frequent the Glendale library. Ms. Bickerstaff asked if we had representatives on the Maricopa County board. Ms. Komemicky said that the Maricopa County Library District and ultimately the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors oversees the money and is the decision maker on how it is used, not the individual cities. The libraries are participating in the Maricopa Association of Governments to dialog with the County Library District. Ms. Lee asked that if the resolution were to be imposed, how would it affect us directly. Ms. Komemicky stated that the money would go to Glendale libraries and not the county; however, it appears from the resolution a municipality would need to form a special tax district and opt out of the County Library. The resolution was pulled and Ms Komemicky did not know if it would be back on the table, but wanted Board members to be aware of the resolution. Ms. Burr asked who oversees this program. Ms. Komemicky stated that it currently was the County Director and ultimately the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors as it is a Maricopa County Library Tax. Ms. Bickerstaff stated that the recession might be a reason people don't want to deal with money issues. Ms. Komernicky is hopeful to continue the dialogue with Maricopa County Library District through the meetings that have been set up with MAG (Maricopa Association of Governments). The next meeting will be September 29, 2009. Ms. Lee thanked Ms. Komemicky for the presentation. LIBRARY DIRECTOR UPDATE Ms. Komernicky provided updates on the following: • Discussion of the Dewey decimal article in the paper. Libraries that are part of the Maricopa County Library District are using this system and it is much like a bookstore. She felt it was important that patrons easily find the materials they are looking for. In the Glendale Public Library system there are over 500,000 books. Glendale is not looking to implement this system right now although some concepts from bookstores have been utilized mostly in the displaying of materials. • Discussion about software programs that have been implemented for the vision and hearing impaired Zoomtext, Magic & JAWS. Ms. Komernicky also visited the Foundation for the Blind and was very impressed with the facility and their programs. She highly recommended a visit. It is located on Northern Avenue and l2t Street. • City Council was presented with a budget update and it will be a few months before actual figures can be analyzed. • At the next meeting,the Library Advisory Board goals for this fiscal year will be discussed. • The Glendale Summer Reading Program was a huge success, coming in 2"d highest in participation to Phoenix. There was an estimated 11,000 children that participated. • Thank you to Diane Nevill for her work on the Glendale History Online grant and the Recession Response Project. This project will bring more computers to the library, meeting the needs of increasing patron usage for job searching and personal development. • Congratulations to Christie O'Hara for winning the Spark Award for her contributions to her neighborhood revitalization. • Ms. Komernicky announced the Employee of the Month recipients as follows: o Patty Orth—July 2009 o Sara Filion - August 2009 o Amanda Rogers— September 2009 All of the employees were very happy and appreciative of their awards. • The city is working hard on the 2010 census. The library will assist in disseminating information to the public. The census will take place between February and April 2010. • Ms. Komernicky discussed the presentations given by individual cities at the AZ Leadership Academy. Glendale had four participants and their presentation was on GED books. Staff participating did an excellent job in their presentation. LIBRARY ADVISORY BOARD COMMENTS AND SUGGESTIONS Ms. Lee asked for comments. None were given. Ms. Lee asked if the library was going to participate in"Banned Books Week" beginning September 26th. Ms. Komernicky stated there would be a display as well as an article in the paper. Ms. Lee commented that September was Hispanic Heritage Month. ADJOURNMENT Ms. Hudson moved that the meeting be adjourned. The motion, seconded by Ms. Donley,passed unanimously. The meeting was adjourned by Ms. Lee at 7:58 p.m. Respectfully Submitted, Cynthia Burmeister