Executive Committee Minutes 03/12/2014

LAUC-B Executive Committee Meeting Minutes

March 12, 2014

10:00 a.m. to noon

303 Doe Library

Members Present: Lynn Jones, Susan Edwards, Cody Hennesy, Lisa Ngo, Rita Evans, Jim Church

Guest: Michaelyn Burnette

I.  Announcements

Lynn announced the tentative date for the LAUC-B Affiliated Libraries Spring Assembly will be April 16.

II. Reports

a.  Approve February minutes

The minutes were approved, with one change correcting an omitted name.

b.  Nominations and Elections Committee (M. Burnette).

The committee met and discussed potential candidates for positions and offices. Many people volunteered for the conference committee, but there were not enough spaces. Ex-comm suggested that people who volunteered and were not asked be invited to run for office or serve on other committees.  A request for nominations, including self-nominations, will go out soon.

c.  Treasurer's Report (L. Ngo)

The current balance is $97,702.  Lisa noted that since the money is budgeted for the current fiscal year, there is potential for carry-over due to the LAUC budgeting change to the calendar year.

d.  UL meeting (L. Jones & R. Evans)

Tom Leonard noted some staff in LHRD will be relocated to Campus Shared Services, including staff in business services.  There was also further discussion of the potential for new library positions as shared in the library early bird on February 26. 

There was discussion on the Response to the Commission’s Report (http://evcp.berkeley.edu/news/commission-future-uc-berkeley-library-report).  A key point will be to include library fundraising in the campus capital campaign. Moffitt has been targeted for this.  Elise Woods is exploring how the library could obtain the funding for fines and over-dues which currently go to the campus.

The Council of University Librarians (CoUL) is reviewing the UCOLASC Strategic Action Groups (SAGs). CoUL does not want library staff to spend more than 10% of their time on this and are concerned about high transaction costs and a low return on this investment.  CoUL is urging for the SAGs to set priorities and establish a smaller number of achievable goals.

e.  Committee on the Library, Berkeley Division of the Academic Senate (R. Evans)

Rita summarized the events of the LIBR March 4 meeting which included:

1.  Framework for Library Reinvestment

a.  Staffing. There is concern the staffing section does not ensure that the 21 lost librarian positions and professional expertise would be restored. Tom Leonard distributed hiring/recruiting handout from the Early Bird. He will respond further in an appendix to the Framework document.

b. Affinity Groups. Tom Leonard said that Affinity Group structure is intended to allow former Subject Specialty Library heads to concentrate on professional librarian roles (reference, collection development, instruction). He stated that Division Heads will have professional duties, not just management ones.

c. Access and ownership.  Discussion of RLF policies and what they mean for long-term access. The RLF governing board desperately needs a faculty representative to fill a vacancy; Tom Leonard will nominate any interested LIBR member.

d. Finances.  Faculty Senate Vice Chair Panos Papadopoulos said Program Progress oversight should be handled by LIBR. He asked if The Library has funds in reserves for its share of new library funding and Tom confirmed that it does from unspent selector funds.

2.  Library Committees and Faculty/Librarian Collaboration

a. The survey of LAUC-B members revealed almost no Library Committees or routine participation by librarians in Faculty Committees. Chair Lovell will write to department chairs to encourage them to establish closer ties with librarians. Several LIBR members said librarians always respond favorably to request for greater collaboration on instruction, collection development or related activities.

3.  NRLF Subcommittee Report

a. Following a site visit to NRLF and discussion with Erik Mitchell and Charlotte Rubens, the subcommittee encouraged LIBR to take initiatives that could lead to funding and construction of Phase III NRLF at the Richmond Bay Campus. A new building will cost $20 million and it would take five years from the time funding is secured to open. NRLF is projected to be full in five years.

b. Discussion at a recent UCLAS meeting made it clear UCOP supports digitization rather than new construction. It considers RLF expansion a matter for CoUL. Tom Leonard  said UCB may take lead and charge other campuses for deposits. Law Schools are potential partners. UCM indicated interest in hosting RLF, citing the lower building cost, but this overlooks the need to duplicate the extensive infrastructure (staffing, reading room) at NRLF and difficult logistics of timely retrieval of material from Merced.

 III.  Old Business

a.  LAUC-B Spring Assembly

Ex Comm discussed events at the upcoming LAUC B Spring Assembly, which is scheduled for Wednesday April 30 from 8:30 to 10:00 in the Morrison Library.  The business meeting will take up the first half hour, followed by the Cultural Diversity celebration which will last one hour. Lynn Jones is preparing an agenda with the list of speakers and performers, and will send this out to LAUC B.

It was also noted that the LAUC system-wide meeting will take place April 23rd at UC Davis.  The Chair, Secretary and Affiliated Representative attend.

IV.  New Business

a.  2014-15 budget

Lisa, Rita and Lynn submitted a budget request for $116,142. They expect to be informed about the result by the end of June.  The new budget assumes 15 new librarians will be in place, for which the budget proposes additional professional development funding to supplement the fixed funding provided by the MOU.

b.  Reschedule April Ex Comm meeting

There will be several absences at the regular time.  We will reschedule for April 25.