Newburyport Public Library
Board of Directors – Regular Meeting
June 1, 2016
Call to Order
The meeting was called to order at 5:15 PM by Elizabeth Valeriani.Attending, in addition to Ms. Valeriani, were Monica Blondin, Kathy Carey, Barbara Dowd, Gary Gorski, Sarah Holden and Steve Moore.Also attending were Head Librarian/Recording Secretary Cynthia Dadd and Sarah Spalding, who has been appointed by Mayor Holaday to fill the unexpired Board term of Sarah White. James Connolly,Marcia Edson, Thomas O'Brien, and Mayor Donna Holaday were absent.
Old Business:
Approval of Minutes
Theminutes of the May 4, 2016 meeting were approved, with corrections, on a motion by Ms. Dowd; seconded by Ms. Holden.
Personnel Update
Ms. Dadd told the Board that Emelyn (Emely) MacIntosh began work on April 25 and is learning well and fitting in with the staff. Emely is preparing to take over adult programming responsibilities from Kat Wilson. . Ms. Dadd has secured the services of a temporary employee, Juliette Drennan, from Bibliotemps. She will cover about 28 hours per week for the next three months. Juliette will be coming in for an orientation this Friday and will begin work on Monday, June 13th. More than a dozen people have applied for the vacant part time Library Technician position and Ms. Dadd will set up interviews soon.
FY17 Budget
Ms. Dadd told the Board that the library's budget hearing with the City Council is scheduled for tomorrow (Thursday) evening. She reported that she has already met with the City Council Budget and Finance sub-committee, discussing the capital budget. Requests have been submittedfor carpet replacements: FY17 - Children's Room and Archival Center / FY18 - second and third floor stacks (total amount approx. $54,000). The capital budget is being sent to the full Council for consideration.
Strategic Planning
The information gathering process has been completed (SWOT analyses, focus groups, community and teen surveys, community forum). Barbara Alevras has been compiling and synthesizing the feedback. Ms. Dadd and Giselle Stevensformulated goals and objectives and the library department heads helped to create some activities/tactics to support them. The last meeting of the Strategic Planning Advisory Group will be held on June 14. Ms. Dadd told the Board that she would bring the completed plan for Board approval to the September meeting. However, in response to a Board request, she will email the final draft to Board members in advance of the meeting.
Policy Review
There have been some minor edits to the Computer Use Policy to reflect a change in procedures for time controls. Patrons may now use up to four hours of computer time per day in any configuration of logins. Prior to this, patrons could use four hours per day, but were limited to two logins. Staff hopes that this will provide some desired flexibility for computer usage.
New Business:
Children’s Room/Teen Loft News/Adult Programs
Allison Driscoll and Sara Smith provided the following report:
The Children's and Teen departments are gearing up for a busy summer. Next Tuesday, they will hold a telescope night to show participants how the telescope works and invite them to sign up for a chance to take it home. All ages are welcome. Other fun programs planned include a sensory learning program, a showing of the movie Zootopia, open play with various building toys, watercolor salt painting (art and science), zentangle and candy sushi.
Adult Programs:
The fiction-focused book club for adults, Novel Ideas, will meet on June 8 (The RosieProject) and July 13(The Nightingale). The non-fiction book group will meet on June 28 (Lafayette in the Somewhat United States). Wednesday movie matinees include: The BigShort, Bridge of Spies, Evening, and Black Mass.
Other programs include the adult coloring group on June 8 and the Bloomsday Program on June 16. This celebration of Dublin features Dublin-born folksinger, historian and humorist Tom O'Carroll in a program of songs, stories and anecdotes. It will incorporate Irish history, language, literature and culture.
Summer Reading Programs
June 11 - The kick-off to the summer reading programs for children, teens and adults begins on Saturday, June 11 with mini-golf in the library stacks, for all ages-9AM-3PM.
April/May Statistics
For the month of April, there were increases in:Overdrive, adult periodicals and children's CDs. The library was open 5 fewer hours than in April of 2015, and had 551 fewer visitors, which is consistent. In May, there were increases in: Overdrive, children's CDs and museum pass borrowing. The variance in children's book borrowing has been significantly reduced since the Children's Room re-organization. Other May statistics: 1,745 logins on adult and teen public PCs ; 5,983 visits to the NPL website and 25,308 connections to the NPL wireless network.
MA Library Association Annual Conference
Ms. Dadd reported that she, Joyce Senior and Anna McGrath attended the Massachusetts Library Association conference last week in Hyannis. It was an excellent conference with many interesting programs [outreach programs, no-desk reference, staff development, pros and cons of innovation, graveyards and using ARIS (state report) statistics.] Melanie Townsend Diggs from the Baltimore Public Library was the keynote speaker. Her address was entitled "The Library as Safe Haven during a Crisis". She talked about her library's response to the unrest and violence in the area following the death of a man who had died in police custody. The dinner speaker was fiction writer Jacquelyn Mitchard. Her previous book was Deep End of theOcean. Her new book is Two If by Sea. Three members of the NPL staff , Joyce Senior, Diane Oxton and Anna McGrath, received ParaLibrarian Certification at the Tuesday evening awards dinner. Ms. Dadd said that she was very gratified to be nominated by NPL staff for the ParaLibrarian Advocate of the Year Award for her support of library paraprofessionals.
Other
Ms. Dadd distributed copies of the article Beyond Books: Eight Things You May Not KnowAbout Libraries, which appeared in a recent issue of USA Today.
JuneCalendar
The Junelibrary calendar was reviewed. Ms. Dadd reviewed her meeting schedule for June.
Adjournment
Ms. Blondin made a motion to adjourn until September 7, barring any pressing business in July or August. Mr. Moore seconded. Passed unanimously.
Respectfully submitted,
Cynthia Dadd
Recording Secretary