October 31, 2001 Meeting Minutes
PRESENT:
Zena Ariola, Melissa Baird, Deb Carver, Deb Merskin, Peter O’Day,
Dan Pope, Gina Psaki, Michael Raymer, Marc Vanscheeuwijck, Peter Watts.
GUEST:
Andrew Bonamici, Associate University Librarian for Administrative & Media
Services.
Interim University Librarian Deb Carver convened the meeting at 9:00 a.m.
·
Victoria Mitchell
began her appointment as Head, Science Library in August.
·
Heather Briston
has accepted the position of University Archivist and will begin in November. Heather
has a JD degree and MLS.
·
The New Media
Center has been integrated into the Library’s Media Services.
·
The renovation
of Rm. 101 in Knight Library is complete. The two main functions of the room are reserves and video
collections. The new furnishings
were added this past summer. The
room is much more heavily used than in the past.
·
The Library
has joined a document delivery consortium called RAPID. This service provides a 24-hour turnaround
for journal articles and is proving to be very successful.
·
The Library
purchased Web of Science database using endowment monies last year. There
has been a great deal of positive feedback.
·
The Friends
of the Library board has been restructured to include faculty and external
constituents, and has been renamed the Advisory Council on Development & Advancement. The
main focus for this group will be fundraising.
·
The results
from last winter’s survey on the quality of Library services have
been positive. There were
a few deficient areas, which are being addressed by an internal working
group, e.g. convenient hours and complete runs of print journals.
·
The discussion
last year that focused on replacing the card catalog with the microfiche
version will be put on hold for the time being. The microfiche version is available,
and after faculty have had the opportunity to use it, we will again look
at removing the card catalog.
·
Knight Library
extended its normal hours the weekend before the start of fall term. Deb
will be getting the use statistics soon, which will help determine whether
the Library will continue the added hours on that weekend.
·
The faculty
senate endorsed the ULC’s proposal last spring ( http://libweb.uoregon.edu/ulc/dir00/ulcmemo-fin.html ). The
ULC and Library will follow-up this year with another meeting with editors
who serve on editorial boards.
·
A memo has been
submitted to the provost requesting an additional $300,000 on a recurring
basis to forestall another serials cancellation in the next 3-5 years. Deb
reported that Provost Moseley reacted favorably to the memo, but that
there is no additional money to add to the Library’s budget.
Deb
reported that the Library has a continuous problem of rising costs
compared to our budget. Factors
affecting this increase in our deficit are:
1)
increased personnel
costs that are self-funded
2)
increased material
costs
3)
increased information
technology costs
In
spite of a 1.5 reduction in FTE, decreased spending in S&S and
student wages, and no increase to the materials budget, the Library
still had a deficit of $700,000 at the end of FY01.
Deb
added that the provost had approved of a special increase to the Library’s
budget, but we are still facing a 2% reduction due to the state’s
financial difficulties. The
tentative proposal is to put the increase towards the shortfall, rather
than towards the materials budget. In
addition to the budgetary increase, the Library is proposing further
reductions in expenditures to reduce the deficit, including a $100,000
reduction in materials budget. This would not affect existing serials,
but would affect purchasing monographs and new serials. Over the past years, the Library has never taken money from
the materials budget. Gina
expressed concern that this proposal contradicts last year’s
plea from the ULC to the provost to protect the serials budget. She
also added that cutting the materials budget will have a negative affect
on scholarly publishing. Others
agreed that it is not a good decision to take money from the materials
budget. Dan stated that he understands the pressure
to work on eliminating the deficit, but would like to see the money
taken from other sources. It was suggested that the Library focus some
donor cultivation efforts on funding books and journals, and increasing
endowments.
Deb
will discuss this further with the provost, letting him know that the
ULC feels very strongly against using an increase to the materials
budget to cover the Library’s deficit. Deb
will update the committee at its next meeting on the budget discussions.
Dan
Pope accepted the committee’s nomination that he serves as chair
of the 2001/2002 University Library Committee.
Deb
distributed copies of the 2001/2002 Library Annual Plan. It highlights the Library’s key
priorities in improving services and collections. See http://libweb.uoregon.edu/ulc/dir01/masterplan0102.html
Deb
will work with Michael Raymer on scheduling a session with faculty
editors before the end of fall term.
Deb would like to ask the Senate to change the membership bylaws to specify that a graduate student should serve on the University Library Committee. Currently the by-laws state that the membership is to include “two students.”
The ULC will be involved in the selection process of the University Librarian. Copies of the position announcement were distributed. Gina and Dan have been appointed to serve on the search committee.
The
next committee meeting will be scheduled during early winter term. S. Gray will be sending out schedule
requests.
The
meeting adjourned at 10:00 a.m.
Submitted
by
Sheila
Gray
http://libweb.uoregon.edu/ulc/dir01/011031.htm