PLA Blog

The last day is the saddest. All the signs are gone. There are ALA Councilors here, some real governance geeks, and staff. It is almost like the rest never happened.

We begin at 8 am. Council III begins with Memorials and Tributes. Memorials are offered for those who have died since Annual. Tributes are for those people who are still alive, or for organizations.

The report of the Tellers reported that Joe Eagan (yay Joe), Em Claire Knowles, and a school librarian Diane Chen. (CD #12.1)

Rod Hershberger gave a great Treasurer’s Report, and there is a lot of detail included in the printed documents. (The CD #13 series)

Three were reports from COSWL (Committee on the Status of Women in Librarianship) had a resolution on caregivers. (CD 41)

The Committee on Organization had three items. The first two passed quickly. The last had issues about candidates for office and their ability to speak or “appear to work” on behalf of their candidacy. This went down in flames. (CD #27)

Constitution and Bylaws approved two affiliate memberships, and then had proposed amendments which get a first reading here, and then a second reading at Annual. (CD #25)

Barbara Stripling reported for the Intellectual Freedom Committee since the chair, and my friend Kent Oliver, was unable to attend. This is a “motherhood and apple pie” part of Council, and conveys great deals of information. (CD #19)

The second “Motherhood and Apple Pie” report is the Committee on Legislation report. Camila Alire gave the report, and spent time talking about the various legislative issues which apply to libraries. There will be a virtual Legislative Day. There were six resolutions:

1. GPO appropriations for free access to electronic documents
2. Adding tribal college libraries to the library depository library program
3. Safeguarding Electronic Government Information and E- Government
4. Postal Rate increases for small circulation publications
5. Commending Whilstleblower on NSLs
6. Funding for the Federal Digital System

There was a very brief report from Blanche Woolls for the International Relations Committee (CD#18) which she made from the floor of Council rather than from the podium. There were no actions.

Saturday morning I attended a program put on by the ALA Public Programs Office on their new initative: grants to libraries to present scholar-led reading and discussion programs on the theme of love and forgiveness in public libraries across the country.

Like previous Let’s Discuss It programs, the Office has partnered with another organization, this time the Fetzer Institute, to develop several series of themed book discussions to be led by humanities scholars in each community. An RFP for thirty $ 2500 grants will be available at the ALA link above on Feb. 4. With only thirty grants available, competition is expected to be fierce, but libraries are free to use the materials on their own without the grant.

The theme actually includes three subthemes, any of which a library may take up. They are Love and Forgiveness in the Presence of the Enemy; Love and Forgiveness in the Light of Death; and Love, Forgiveness and Wisdom. Each theme is developed by five books (all available in inexpensive paperback) and essays written by scholars on each book. The local humanities scholar engaged by the library is expected to develop very brief lectures on each book and faciliate discussion.

The grant is meant to cover purchase of the books, duplication of essays, marketing, honoraria for the scholar, travel to a training program to be held in Chicago in the Fall, and marketing of the program. Participating libraries are expected to develop partnerships with other community organizations to market and deliver the program. The terms of the grant are quite strict though some adaptation to local circumstances is anticipated. Libraries will likely need to come up with matching funds or in-kind services to accomplish the program.

Libraries do not need to receive a grant in order to make use of the materials. If fact, those libraries will have more freedom to adapt the program to their own needs, though they will forego the training and other technical assistance (and, of course, the $2500).

In addition to this theme, several other previously developed themes with book lists, essays and other supporting materials are supported at the Let’s Talk About It website.

Tuesday mornings in the Convention Center are always sad. We come to the Convention Center to find that all the registration booths are coming down. Signs are gone, exhibits closed, ALA Store gone. I always find it somewhat depressing.

Today’s agenda started (after the business items) with the report from Policy Monitoring Committee . Many of there items were housekeeping and merely involve deciding where past Council actions appear in the handbook. There was much discussion on the election guidelines. These are not policies, and therefore not in the Handbook. Should “officers” be allowed to endorse candidates? Should units? Is not allowing this stifling our first amendment rights? These were the topics covered. The Executive Board has been charged with (again) reviewing the guidelines, and I can expect that there will be more discussion.

Janet Swan Hill did a masterful job of presenting the report. Janet then continued to report on the E-Participation Task Force. (ALA CD#35)

The Council Orientation Committee (CD#40) had an item which got a surprising amount of discussion. There was discussion about shortening the length of conferences. BARC (the Budget Analysis and Review Committee) will review this issue and report at summer.

We heard more on the graduated dues. And there was yet more discussion. [editorial remarks] Some people just don’t get that we have “semi-graduated” dues already. They also don’t get that doing salary based dues are patently unfair if the same scale is used across the country. [end editorial]

The Committee on Accreditation report almost got referred to the Education Task Force. There was extended discussion of whether COA did a good job. <editorial, again> The report presented incredibly minor editorial changes where many of us want much more. <end editorial>

The Committee on Professional Ethics (CD#38) report was presented. There are several important additions. They were passed with some discussion.

Honorary Membership was voted for Peggy Sullivan, Effie Lee Morris, and Pat Mora.

Keith Michael Fiels read the petition candidates whose petitions had been received.

Attendance as of Monday 10,533 registrants with exhibitors total was 13,601 which was up 1,300 from last year at the same time.

I have started to add the numbers to Council Documents.

Let me take a moment to talk about them. Every document delivered to Council and the Executive Board gets a number. For Council, these are CD, and for the Executive Board they are EBD. They are then followed by a number. If there is a subsequent document or revision, then the number is followed by a decimal point.

For Council there are some standards. The Agendas are always “8″ and the Financial Reports are part of the 13 series.

The numbering system continues from Midwinter through Annual, and then starts over again. So it is also important to note the ALA Fiscal Year. They also often indicate if they are Midwinter or Annual meeting documents.

They are all available from the ALA Governance Office. Council Documents come from Lois Ann Gregory-Wood, and for this meeting, Executive Board Documents come from JoAnn Kempf.

Many of the Division Boards and ALA Committees use similar numbering systems.

Ethics, Joanne Pinder reported on the proposed changes in the ALA Code of Ethics.

Clara Bohrer reported on the finances of PLA. Fund balance was about $25,000 lower than expected partly because the Spring Symposium was not as successful as budgeted. The other reason is a printing cost which will be recovered when the published book is finally sold. Clara then reviewed the current year. The reports do not show any revenue for the conference which will occur in March. PLA is set with a cyclical budget for spending more in one year and capturing revenue from conferences in the other years. Registration for the conference is running ahead of Boston.

Budget assumption for the future is that there will be an endowment transfer in the years in which conferences are held. BARC has created a new series of budget review guidelines. One item noted was that the budget to actual variance should be no more than 5%. It is not clear whether that is on the overall budget or for individual line items.

Molly Fogarty reported on the Deliberative Dialog meeting on December 12. She explained the purpose of the meeting was about getting groups within ALA to consensus on a stand. In the particular case it was over GPO standards. The goal was to establish a protocol if units cannot agree.

There was discussion of the Emerging Leaders Program about participants and how the project worked.

Carolyn Anthony reported on the Library Support Staff Certification Program which is an IMLS program jointly with Western Council of State Libraries. They have developed a set of competencies. This expected to be completed in the summer of 2010. The next year is policy and procedure and on assessment (tests, portfolio, experience). It will then be field tested using the CPLA model. It is an exciting idea.

Sunil Iyengar, director of research and analysis for the National Endowment for the Arts, reported on a survey on reading. Survey of adults showed less than half had read a book of poetry, fiction in the past year. Lots of data. Partly in answer, they created the Big Read to encourage communities to read the same book.

Battery dying. More to come.

I missed the beginning of this meeting because it overlaps with a committee appointment I hold on the Membership Committee. So, I spent a half hour at AL Membership Committee before traipsing back to the Convention Center to the meeting.

I walked into the reports from the Clusters to the Board with the reactions to the proposed change to the bylaws. There was some concern over change, and there were a lot of questions about the transition process which has yet to be outlined. Great quoted from PLA President Jan Sanders: “We are not sure yet what this camel looks like, never mind how fast it runs.”

There will need to be some additional documents prepared and out to PLA members to explain the plan and transition. While there were many questions raised, there was much positive reaction. One of the senses is that the new bylaws will allow a great deal more flexibility in how PLA.

[Audience comments: members of the audience included my friends Danny Hales, ex-EB Member Nann Blaine Hilyard, several staff, JoAnn Pinder past ALA Treasurer candidate and past PLA President (I think), past ALA Presidential Candidate Claudia Sumler, Committee on Legislation Chaire Molly Fogarty Past PLA President Clara Bohrer. There were about 20 people in the audience, pretty good.]

ALA Exec Board Member Marion Gonzales came to talk. Even with the dues increase, there was not only no loss in members, but a very modest increase. This has also had a positive impact on revenue. There have been housing issues with conferences. Beginning with 2009 you must be registered for the conference in order to book a room. for Anaheim 50% of the rooms were booked on the very first day. The Graduated Dues Study was noted (see the post on ALA Council Info Session.) ALA-APA has its first CPLA administrator. There are 87 candidates participating and hope for 3 more by Annual. National Library Workers Day is April 15.

Nann Blaine Hilyard visited to talk about the potential of merger between ALTA and FOLUSA.

{Stay tuned for part 2…I’m heading back to Membership.}

I wanted to try to do this from the Board meeting, but had some technical troubles. Therefore there will be some well ex post facto posts on Board actions.

The initial meeting began with a broad ranging discussion of creating a new structure for PLA. This process has been underway for more than a year. I had some concerns going in, but spent some time talking to a Past President who had been very involved in creating the current structure. The current structure was created to get away from a very traditional structure which had sections each with a bylaws committee, and other parallel structures.

However the cluster idea is not really working, and it is felt that the size of the PLA Board is too large. As in the larger association, many members cannot run for office or serve on committees because they have trouble getting funding and support for attending both Midwinter and Annual every year.

Part of what will happen is that there will be some association committees, but there will be flexibility to create (and disband) what ALA calls “Discussion Groups” and what PLA will call a “Community of Practice.

It is an interesting concept and the bylaws were crafted in such a way as to allow more flexibility.

There was considerable discussion on one section of the proposed bylaws which would remove decisions on dues increases from a vote of the membership and invest that decision with the Board. I believe the final decision is that this will be removed. A number of us (and yes, I was one) expressed concern that the dues issue could overshadow the re-structuring issue and cause the defeat of the whole package.

We will review the changes we discussed (some wordsmithing, some content) at our second meeting on Monday.

About 100 people are here listening to the candidates debate. First to speak is my friend (and the candidate I support) Camila Alire. Her theme is “Vision, Vitality, and Voice.”

Among other proposals is for an “At Home ALA Legislative Day” to have coordinated visits to legislators while they are home.

Good salaries and better salaries are on her agenda, including our ability to advocate for ourselves. Camila is committed to diversity (and was president of REFORMA a number of years ago). Equity of Access is on her list. Literacy skills are critical.

Camila is incredibly vivacious and the vitality part of her platform rings personally true.

Linda Williams is a school librarian from Maryland and is someone I know and like. Libraries are our foundation and our future is her theme. Equity of Access is an important goal. (She mentioned speaking with one voice (which can be a sensitive topic in ALA!) She will work to break down the “silos” in ALA. (A good idea!)

She did focus on the closing of school libraries and the fact that 40% of schools do not have library professionals.

We need to engage more members in the association. She referred to an ASAE book which addresses the needs of younger members of the profession. She wants ALA to use Web 2.0 skills to engage members of the Association.

Dr. Ruth Gordon asked the first question. Which was a multipart question and included a reference to ALA’s “third rail,” the Operating Agreement.

Leonard Kniffel, editor of the American Libraries, talked about the various ways that AL will distribute the statements and question and answers in several ways. His question was about bi-lingual education. (And there is not much difference between the two candidates on this issue.

[I am going back to the PLA Board, having “shown the flag” at the forum.]

This post also at Thoughts from a Library Administrator.

Melora Ranney Norman wrote and presented a resolution on access to ALA lists. The problem is that ALA has a policy on open meetings where any member may attend any open meeting. (Those which are closed are awards and those parts of meetings dealing with personal/institution information like accreditation and nominations.) However, it recently came to light that there are many electronic lists which are not open to members. After much discussion, the resolution was referred to the Task Force on Electronic Participation which is chaired by Janet Swan Hill. Council I adjourned on time!

by Michael Golrick

The first official Council meeting has begun. Of course we start with a whole lot of housekeeping items. There have been six people nominated to run for the ALA Executive Board. Nominations from the floor include Joseph Egan (Maryland Chapter Councilor) since there were no Chapter Councilors nominated.

To run for the Executive Board, you must have served at least one year as a member of Council. The others nominated are Frances Roscello, Diane R. Chen, Thomas Wilding, Dora Ho, Pam Sieving, and Em Claire Knowles.

Three will be elected to serve beginning at the end of the Annual Conference in Anaheim.

The most of the remainder of the meeting is reports: President’s Report, President-Elect’s Report, Executive Director’s Report, Review of the Executive Board Actions, and Implementation of the ALA Council Actions.