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Bucks County Free Library Board
The Regular Meeting of the Board of Directors of the Bucks
County Free Library was held at the District Library Center in Doylestown. The
meeting was called to order at 5:38 p.m. Present were: Det Ansinn, President; Bill Draper, Vice President; Roberta Foerst, Secretary; Jerry Balchis,
Treasurer; Mary Ann Beltz and Christina Paugh-Greenwood, Board Trustees; Martina Kominiarek,
Executive Director; Sue Ziegler, Public Services Director; John Doran, Chief
Financial Officer; and
A MOTION to APPROVE the minutes of the Regular Meeting of November 18, 2008 was made by Draper, SECONDED by Foerst and APPROVED unanimously.
STAFF REPORTS
Report of Assistant Branch Librarian/Doylestown
After leading everyone in a holiday song Assistant Branch
Librarian Darcy Fair reported that the staff at the District Library Center in
Doylestown has been phenomenal to work with as she transitioned from another
branch. She went on to talk about the youth services outreach efforts, which
includes preschools and elementary schools. This past summer she presented
“Stories in the Park” and reached about 800 people, with crowds growing each
session due to word-of-mouth publicity. Through outreach they were able to
inform and promote library services available for teachers and caregivers,
particularly those available online. First Friday events at the library
provided opportunities for children to be creative, meet and mingle with
neighbors and view performances. Fair applied for and received a grant from the
Greater Philadelphia Cultural Alliance that she will be using to fund
performances for two First Friday events. The first will take place in February
and is titled Celebrating African America and will feature South
African drummer and traditional musician Mogauwane Mahloele. Then, in May local middle and high school
students will give a dramatized presentation of poems from 2008 Newbery
Award-winning author Laura Amy Schlitz’s book entitled, “Good Masters! Sweet
Ladies!: Voices
from a Medieval Village.” Executive Director Martina Kominiarek noted that
state legislators have been invited to attend these events.
Report of Executive Director (submitted in writing) Executive Director Martina Kominiarek introduced Connie Hillman, who was recently appointed to the position of Youth Service Consultant, explaining that this position helps to lead and train youth services employees throughout Bucks County and acting as project manager for countywide youth services projects. Although she is new to this position, she worked previously at the Warminster Library for ten years.
Hillman reported that the Summer Reading Program in 2008 was up 30% countywide and 35% at BCFL branches. She explained that the programming numbers jumped largely through outreach efforts of staff who “thought outside the box” and found new ways to reach children. Funding for this program is always a concern, but she said that they were fortunate to get a $10,000 donation from TD Bank for next year’s program. She is currently working on marketing plans to promote the library and hopefully garner donations. She is working with the United Way Coalition and also the Bucks County Intermediate Unit to promote the library’s youth services in common areas of interest, such as Reading Olympics and school reading lists. She said that she feels privileged to work with the youth services staff, who are a phenomenal group of people.
Kominiarek distributed circulation policies that are the culmination of about two years’ worth of hard work. She pointed out that the library had never had comprehensive circulation policies prior to this and that they all had to be agreed upon by each of the Bucks County public libraries, since the computer system is shared by all. They were given to the BCFL board so that they can review them with a final vote to approve them not later than the March board meeting. She discussed with the board some of the policies that had changes to current practice (allowing online renewals with less than $5 fines as opposed to $0.0) or that were new (borrowing materials by library staff).
She reminded the board that the Library Behavior policy should continue to be reviewed so that it could be voted on at an upcoming meeting. Also, she and the BCFL attorney were continuing to work on the Employee Handbook and it will be presented to the board soon. The BCFL attorney, Dave Spitko, will be presenting a workshop on the new Pennsylvania Open Records Law on Friday, January 16, 2009. CPL directors and their board members were invited to attend as well as BCFL board and branch managers.
Report of Public Services Director (submitted in
writing)
Sue Ziegler welcomed head union steward Diane Kraus, who was attending
the board meeting. Ziegler noted that the Unique Management Services collection
project would officially start on January 5, 2009 and that it would probably
take several months until we can report detailed information back to the board
on the project. Report of Chief Financial
Officer
MOTION to APPROVE the payment of bills for November 2008 in the amount of $667,706.57 was made by Draper, SECONDED by Beltz and APPROVED unanimously.
MOTION to APPROVE the November 2008 financial statements (subject to audit) was made by Beltz, SECONDED by Foerst, and APPROVED unanimously.
MOTION to APPROVE a 3% increase for non-bargaining unit staff members for 2009 to coincide with the bargaining unit increase of 3% was made by Draper, SECONDED by Balchis, and APPROVED unanimously.
MOTION to APPROVE the new TIAA-CREF and AUL plan documents that state that BCFL staff participants must be 21 years old in order to participate was MADE by Beltz, SECONDED by Draper, and APPROVED unanimously.
CFO John Doran said that the January 2009 meeting would discuss BCFL’s budget. The commissioners’ meeting was to take place the next day at which time we would find out how much we would be receiving from the county for 2009. Board secretary Foerst asked whether budgeting could proceed without the determination from the state in January as to how much we would be receiving. Doran stated that as far as we know, any cuts would be minimal, and in any case, we would make any necessary adjustments. The payment from the state is expected in late January or early February.
Board Committee Reports:
Treasurer Jerry Balchis reported for the Nominating Committee on the slate of officers nominated for 2009. They are: Det Ansinn, President; Bill Draper, Vice President; Roberta Foerst, Secretary; Jerry Balchis, Treasurer. The president asked for nominations from the floor. There being none, a MOTION to close the nominations was made by Beltz, SECONDED by Ansinn, and APPROVED unanimously. Votes to approve each officer was taken individually and each were approved unanimously, so the 2009 slate of officers was approved.
The Governance and Finance Committees have not held any meetings since there was not a full contingent of board members from July through December. An ad hoc Fundraising Committee did meet to discuss the fiscal challenges ahead that will require some creative thinking. This committee would like to hold another meeting in January to include the Executive Director and the CFO. They felt that they were off to a good start with the first meeting.
Board President Det Ansinn stated that the Governance and Finance Committees will start to regroup and meet regularly now that a full contingent of board members was available. As per the by-laws the board treasurer will chair the Finance Committee and the Vice President will chair the Governance Committee. New board member Christina Paugh-Greenwood joined the Governance Committee along with Vice President Bill Draper and trustee Mary Ann Beltz. The Finance Committee will consist of Treasurer Jerry Balchis, Secretary Roberta Foerst and new board member Charles Meredith (absent). The chairs of each committee were asked to coordinate with their members to establish mutually convenient dates/times to meet, meeting with some regularity to keep the committees current.
Correspondence – Submitted in writing. Copies of letters sent from
the County to the two new BCFL board members were received. The board noted the attendance of Christina Paugh-Greenwood and welcomed her to the board.
Public Comment – No public commented.
Unfinished business – Library Behavior Policy – It was
decided that this would be an agenda item for the Governance Committee at their
next meeting in January.
New Business – None
There being no further business, a MOTION to ADJOURN was made at 6:30 p.m. by Draper, SECONDED by Balchis and so MOVED.
Respectfully submitted,
Pamela J. Riley
Executive Assistant
APPROVED
BY BOARD OF DIRECTORS
JANUARY
20, 2009
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Copyright
© 2008 The Bucks County Free Library
