Board of
Library Trustees Meeting
June 7, 2011
7:00 p.m.
Attendees:
Trustees:
Carol Brown
MaryAnn Cabibbo
Ed Duggan
Chris Monahan
William Roberts
Wendy Rowe
Citizens:
Margaret Perkins, Assistant to the Director
Minutes:
Margaret called the meeting to order at 7:05 and took nominations
for chair:
Motion to nominate Wendy as Chair, MAC1, ED2. As there were
no other nominations, Margaret brought it to a vote and
Wendy was elected unanimously.
Wendy took over and asked for nominations for Secretary.
Motion to nominate Bill as Secretary: MAC1, CB2. Again as there were no other nominations, Bill found himself elected unanimously,
Lastly Wendy asked for nominations for vice-chair:
Motion to nominate Carol Brown as Vice Chair, MAC1, BR2. With no further nominations Carol was elected by universal acclamation
So the Trustee officers are:
Wendy Rowe, chair,
Carol Brown, vice-chair
Bill Roberts, secretary
Wendy's first act after all that was to welcome Chris, our newly elected Trustee.
Motion to approve the agenda. (MAC1, BR2) passed unanimously
Motion to approve the Secretary's reports for April and May: (MAC1, CB2), passed 5-0-1, Bill abstained as he missed one of the meetings and most of the other.
We're on target to zero out our budget lines
The union approved the contract
Wendy will remove the website stuff mentioning Franklin after June 30.
The Southwick's Zoo tickets bought by the Friends are selling well.
We have the school summer reading list
Have a new bar code reader. This is for materials circulating to other libraries, it does away with the need for transit slips. We need to get bar codes on the outside of the materials, but can do it gradually.
We have mice again, one with possible criminal intent as it likely set off the burglar alarm. Franklin was called about this.
Cocoa matts are being purchased with this year's money.
Air conditioning repairs are in abeyance, we're waiting to hear status from the DPS. 2 units aren't working.
Wendy relayed thanks from Felicia to the Board.
2 interns from Simmons will be with us for the summer. 1 will work on children's programming such as 4-H, stories, etc. Lorie has ideas. The other will work on the archival management of recent documents (not what's in the historic room). They will each work 10 hours a week, without pay. When Margaret is not around, Katherine and Lorie will watch out for them.
The Friends are eager to get more involved. Ed attended their meeting and encouraged them to come and talk.
Deferred
There is a Special Town Meeting warrant to make some of the money from the Municipal Agreement available to acquire a self-checkout station.
It would be put in the children's disused checkout area.
It would not be coupled with self-serve access to one's reserved materials, these will remain behind the desk for the time being.
Ed questioned how much staff time it would save, he felt it would come nowhere near replacing a person.
Motion to support Article 4 of the Special Town meeting (the self checkout transfer) (CB1, CM2) passed unanimously
Fincom opposed the Town Meeting library warrant article which would have started the process to change the town charter primarily because they felt that the Library Trustees and the Selectmen had not met and discussed it
Wendy felt we needed to talk to them.
MaryAnn questioned what it would accomplish.
Ed thought it should be a special round table meeting, not part of a regular Selectmen's meeting.
Carol said that the agenda of the meeting should be Library Planning.
Wendy will start the process of arranging such a meeting, perhaps in July.
Margaret presented her thoughts on increasing hours.
It can't be managed with a 2 person schedule. Any sensible additional hours will require that the staff take a lunch or dinner break and so 3 are needed. 4 if we have a story hour or other event.
If we are open 4 extra hours, we get an additional $1400 in state aid (as things stand), being open 8 extra hours would get us our full state aid ($2800 more).
Extending the hours into the evenings is easier and would also make the meeting rooms more attractive. However 8-9pm is traditionally one of the lightest usage times. Mornings would be better for the patrons.
Any additional hours should be consistent so as to be easy to remember.
The suggestion is to add additional part time library assistant time. The added cost, after subtracting the increased State Aid from the added salary cost, would be roughly $2500 for 4 additional hours, $5000 for 8 hours. This would be paid for by using more of the Tuchinsky interest for materials thus freeing up the Town's money to pay the additional staff time.
The Trustees all felt that this was worth pursuing
Motion: To open an additional 4 hours a week by taking up to $2500 from the Tuchinksy interest to allow us to pay for additional library assistant hours from the Municipal Appropriation. (MAC1, WLR2). After some discussion, it seemed a reasonable thing to table the motion till July to give Margaret more time to come up with a detailed plan.
Motion to table above (CB1, MAC2): 5-1, Ed opposed, feeling that we ought to approve it now.
Deferred
Deferred
Deferred
Motion to adjourn (8:15PM) (MAC1, CB2), passed unanimously
| Account | Acct # | Start Balance | Expen. To Date | End Balance | % Spent |
| Salaries - Full Time | 5110 | $78,926.00 | $70,116.55 | $8,809.45 | 88.84% |
| Salaries - Part Time | 5111 | $65,236.00 | $57,758.22 | $7,477.78 | 88.54% |
| Longevity | 5150 | $850.00 | $850.00 | $0.00 | 100.00% |
| Electricity | 5211 | $16,756.00 | $12,250.97 | $4,505.03 | 73.11% |
| Heating Fuel | 5212 | $8,543.00 | $7,708.75 | $834.25 | 90.23% |
| Trash | 5232 | $1,800.00 | $1,677.75 | $122.25 | 93.21% |
| Water & Sewer | 5231 | $400.00 | $705.95 | ($305.95) | 176.49% |
| R & M Miscellaneous | 5240 | $1,562.00 | $7,632.65 | ($6,070.65) | 488.65% |
| Telephone | 5341 | $1,150.00 | $1,096.10 | $53.90 | 95.31% |
| Supplies | 5400 | $10,001.00 | $1,616.29 | $8,384.71 | 16.16% |
| Postage | 5343 | $264.00 | $264.00 | $0.00 | 100.00% |
| OPS - (Minuteman bill) | 5380 | $22,664.00 | $22,667.00 | ($3.00) | 100.01% |
| Media | 5427 | $1.00 | |||
| Books | 5521 | $1.00 | |||
| Travel | 5710 | $1.00 | |||
| TOTAL - GENERAL FUND | $208,155.00 | $184,344.23 | $23,810.77 | 88.56% | |
| Start Balance | Expen. To Date | Income to Date | Account Bal | ||
| Memorial Donations | 5400 | $23,244.12 | $30,727.20 | $16,372.62 | $8,889.54 |
| Tuchinsky Fund Interest | $39,447.11 | $1,746.94 | $1,127.69 | $38,827.86 | |
| Tuchinsky Fund Principal | $102,869.11 | $102,869.11 | |||
| Library Restitution Fund | 024-610-706-4773 | $13,195.47 | $3,304.36 | $1,148.64 | $11,039.75 |
| Copier & Printer Rev. Fund | 024-610-722-4840 | $2,399.74 | $366.95 | $936.08 | $2,968.87 |
| Meeting Room Rev. Fund | 024-610-723-4840 | $1,574.18 | $540.00 | $2,114.18 | |
| Free Public Library | 2017 | $3,500.63 | $3,418.34 | $8,642.23 | $8,724.52 |
| TOTAL - OTHER FUNDS | $186,230.36 | $39,563.79 | $28,767.26 | $175,433.83 | |
| * received credit from EBSCO of $220.58 |