Lawrence Memorial Board of Trustees
Meeting Minutes
October 18, 2017
Attending:
Board Members: Caroline Engvall, Mary Yates, Lynn Camara, Anne Wallace, Jill Mackler
Staff: Nancy Wilson
Minutes from the previous meeting accepted unanimously.
Librarian’s Report:
Nancy has submitted a written report. The library continues to get busier. Nancy will prepare a five year comparison of library use to go over at a future meeting.
Nancy posted on Front Porch Forum about using good sources to do research. She has received lots of positive feedback for it. She felt obligated to respond to recent posts promoting untruths.
Nancy does intend to begin a survey of our busiest times at the library. We’ll consider any possible changes in hours after that is done.
The cover is off the aquarium because it keeps falling in. Caroline will tell Noah about it.
The board has some suggestions for improving the donate button on the website. Paulita has changed it to a heart. Caroline suggests that when a user hovers over the heart the words “Show your library love” pop up. Others think this is a little off putting because it sends users to a donate button. Nancy cautions that the donation section of the library is a work in progress and that things will change. She’ll share the feedback with Paulita.
Two good books that board members have liked recently are Teeth and Lincoln in the Bardo.
Nancy attended the annual Homecard meeting today and has volunteered to be on a committee drawing up best practices for members of the system. The recent addition of Addison County libraries has been a little chaotic because there are no written procedures for adding people to the system.
Treasurer’s Report:
Nancy mentions that back in August, when she was on vacation, our bookkeeper, Nancy Palermo-Lee did two weeks of payroll. When Nancy asked her how much we should pay her she said, no problem, she wouldn’t charge. Nice!
Mary has been in contact with some investment folks. We need to get together some statements to show Christine Moriarty, of MoneyPeace and Patrick Berry, from the Vermont Community Foundation. They will both come to talk to us about the endowment. Mary will schedule meetings with Patrick at 5:00 on Monday November 13th and Christine at 6:30 that same day. Nancy and Mary will gather information for them ahead of the meetings.
We now have online access to the Sapphire accounts.
Nancy will have a draft budget at the November meeting.
Old Business:
Nancy forgot that she was responsible for doing the posts publicizing the auditions for the 10 Below Variety Show. She will do it tomorrow. John Kromer will be our master of ceremonies.
New Business:
Lynn has an idea for a project to spread love and positivity in our community. In the community where she works a group made small notes of affirmation that they took to a bookstore and tucked inside the books. How great would it be we could do something like that in Bristol? Nancy thinks it would be amazing to get the teens at the Hub involved. She will talk to Ryan or Brian at the Hub soon.
Nancy has had the electrician come to replace some bulbs and take a look at our fixtures. He suggested we plan to replace our conventional fluorescents with LED fixtures. It could be expensive and we may want to consider doing it in stages. Eastview Electric will give us an estimate.
Anne mentions that there is a community effort to involve high school students in local boards. She will tell us how this works out. We would love a high school student on our board.
Adjournment:Meeting adjourned at7:45
Agenda for the next meeting (October 18, 2017 at 6:30)
- Review agenda
- Visitor’s business
- Review of and acceptance of meeting minutes
- Librarian’s report
- Treasurer’s report—make investment fund decisions
- Old Business
- New business
9. Summary
10. Next meeting date