Falcon Meeting Minutes

 

Date:     02/17/05

 

Minutes:

Approval of November minutes, correcting the spelling of Port Byron, motion to accept by Newfield, seconded by Dryden, passed.

 

Present:

Apalachin, Aurora, Candor, Cato, Dryden, Groton,  Homer, McGraw, Moravia, Newfield, Owego, Poplar Ridge, Port Byron, Seneca Falls, TCPL, Trumansburg, Union Springs, Waterloo, Waverly, Weedsport, Rex,  Kathy, Eric, Jan, Karen, and Robert from FLLS.

 

Absent:

 Alternatives, Auburn, Berkshire, Cincinnatus, Fair Haven, Interlaken, Lodi, Marathon, Newark Valley, Nichols, Ovid, and Spencer.

 

Announcements:

  • Karen encouraged all libraries to send a letter to the legislature regarding the 5% decrease in funding. There is a link to a form letter on the FLLS website.
  • There is a self evaluation on Windows included with your packet today, please fill out and return to Jan. There is an additional copy for you to take back to your library and give to your staff also.

 

Old Business:

1)      Kathy handed out procedures for handling overdue, lost and damaged ILL’s from other member libraries. Overdue fines should be collected from patrons but do not need to be forwarded to the owning library. Fine amounts may vary from the borrowing library’s fine rate. Most overdue items automatically roll over to lost after 60 days, except for TCPL, DRY, GRO, NEW & TRU which are set at 30 days and Auburn, whose items NEVER go lost. The patron is responsible for paying for any lost materials. The borrowing library should collect payment and forward to the owning library along with the author, title, call number, and barcode of item being paid for. A receipt should also be issued from the owning library acknowledging payment for the lost item. The holding should then be deleted by the OWNING library. The patron will be charged the amount that appears on the patron record for the lost item. This amount is the replacement cost, plus any processing fees. Processing fees are automatically added by Dynix and cannot be manually added once the item’s status has been changed to lost. If the borrowing library is unable to collect payment from the patron, then they are responsible for reimbursing the owning library for the replacement cost of the lost item (including processing fee). Lost items should be addressed within three months of being overdue and should be paid for within six months.

 

Reports have been set up for each library in their circulation account under MISCR, to identify overdue and lost ILL's. Local patron records may be updated by paying or waiving the amounts due but the status should remain “Lost by Patron” until the owning library deletes the item. Items should NOT be set to withdrawn or deleted from Dynix, except by the owning library. A patron should not purchase a replacement copy unless this has been agreed upon by the owning library. Refer to the handout for more details.

 

In Polaris it is a system wide policy that determines when an item is converted to lost. The replacement cost should be in the price field of the holdings record, if not, Dynix will use the average replacement cost that is linked to the item type. Melanie from TCPL indicated that their $10 processing fee covers a new case if needed, labels, covering and a security strip. Patrons with lost items are not included in the Purge Inactive Patron utility.

 

A question was asked as to whether other libraries have access to the collection agency function in Dynix. Rex said that they do but keep in mind that the collection agency charges a fee based on each account turned in. There was a vote to accept the procedures for handling overdue and lost ILL's. Weighted voting was explained and the motion was passed unanimously.

 

New Business:

 

1)      Last patron information was discussed. Presently there is no last patron information on items checked out to TCPL patrons, since it is deleted as soon as the item is checked in. If the item is checked in at your library, the transit slip will prove who had the item checked out. So if the item is damaged or is missing pieces, once it is checked in, the last patron information is gone. Most of the member libraries have last patron information set to 90 days.

 

2)      A procedure for tracking Internet use was discussed. If a patron uses an Internet station in the library and his card is not scanned, no activity date or last use date is recorded. Options are to attach a barcode to each PC, scan the patron barcode in Checkout, and then scan the barcode on the PC. Another option is to have several barcodes on a card and scan one from the list at Checkout. These barcodes can be reused; however they will need to be attached to a holding. There must be an actual transaction for it to count as activity.

 

3)      Cleaning up the database prior to migration was discussed. It was determined that since batch changes to item records can be done in Polaris, it is more important to concentrate on cleaning up your patron records. As instructed, the PSTAT1 field should ONLY contain the smallest geographic location where the patron resides. PSTAT2 should contain funding district information, such as a school district. PSTAT3 is optional and may be used to identify Head of Household, Donors, etc. Printouts were sent with your annual report statistics identifying PSTAT errors in your patron records. These MUST be corrected before we migrate.

 

4)      An implementation schedule was handed out and discussed. Rex will be sending out a weekly migration memo with highlights of new developments. March 2-4, a migration consultant from Polaris will be here. Polaris training for FLLS staff and key trainers will be from May 23-27th. Regional “hands on” training sessions will tentatively run from June 1 – 30th. July 7 – 11th, circulation will begin on Polaris in an offline mode. The data will then be uploaded once we are officially online. If you feel it would be easier to close your library from the 7th through the 11th, that it up to you and your Board.

 

5)      In Polaris, some policies and settings will be system wide; therefore committees need to be formed to deal with these issues. A Circulation committee was formed consisting of TRU, TCPL (Jon), NEW, MOR, MCGR, APAL, Kathy, and Jan from FLLS. A Holds/ILL committee was formed with TCPL (Shelley), GRO, WAV, TRU, and Kathy from FLLS. A PowerPac committee was formed with CATO, WEED, WAV, OWE, TCPL (Jen & Rosie). Minutes from each committee will be sent to the group and your trustees. Rex also suggested the formation of a Price Restructuring committee. We need to look at multiple ways of charging for the automated system as a means of supporting it. An example he gave was to charge for the number of holdings plus the number of patrons plus the number of circulations plus the number of work stations. This new price structure should be in place by the end of 2005 and implemented in 2007. Volunteers for this committee are: TRU, NEW, TCPL (Janet Steiner), WAV, GRO, UNS, and Rex.

 

6)      A Polaris training survey will be sent out to help us identify training needs at each library and the number of key staff who will need to attend.

 

7)      Polaris will not use port numbers but instead will be using either VPN (Virtual Private Network) or by using terminal services. You will not be able to use the staff client from home. You will be able to access the web catalog though. If you plan on replacing any PC’s they need to be in place by the end of April. They must be Windows 2000 or Windows XP.

 

8)      Eric discussed recent changes to the FLLS home page. We are recommending Deep Freeze, which is similar to Centurion Guard, this software protects against any changes to a library’s computer settings. If changes are made, once the PC is rebooted, it reverts back to its original settings. This software is being installed on all NEW Public PC’s. If you would like to purchase Deep Freeze to install on any older PC’s, the cost is a one time fee of $30 for each PC. This software is not necessary on your circulation or office PC’s. If you are ordering a new public PC, FLLS will add $30 for the Deep Freeze software.

 

9)      New billing and payment procedures for purchase were discussed due to problems with some libraries not paying their bills on time. On any purchase over $200, CNS will send out a quote and they must receive a check made out to the vendor before the item is ordered.

 

Open Discussion:

1)      IPac will be available during the downtime in July; however there will not be the ability to place holds or renew items during that time.

2)      Groton asked how many libraries have wireless access. Rex will post to FLLS List Serve a spreadsheet on wireless access cost.

 

Meeting adjourned:

                 12 Noon

 

Next Meeting:

                May 19th. All meetings are now 9:30 – 11:30 am