Runs are between 500-1100 labels at this time. TP receives an average of about 55 boxes of materials a day. The garage is at this time overflowing with delivered materials.
Now that TP is at full staff again, Heidi and Christy have been busy catching up on a backlog of defective materials to be returned, paperwork, filing, etc. Heidi has been trying to order sufficient supplies to last while she is on vacation for three weeks, and to make arrangements for her absence.
The bindery will pick up the fall bindery group on Oct. 22, at which time they will also bring back the genealogy materials rebound for DN. The fall bindery group should be returned to TP around Christmas or New Year's at which time the bindery will pick up the next genealogy group for rebinding. The spring bindery is tentatively scheduled to be picked up by Quality Book Binding Company around March 23 or 24 at which time they will also return the rebound genealogy materials.
TP received 6 shipments of materials from Ingram without invoices on 8-22-03. Apparently no invoices were ever input due to a problem at their Ft. Wayne warehouse. Despite several calls to Ingram's customer service dept., our Ingram sales rep., and the customer service supervisor, TP is still without invoices for these materials. The latest information is that the problem is still ongoing at Ingram; now the vice president, Larry Price, is apparently involved and trying to find a solution to this problem. The saga is still ongoing.
Heidi had BTE's AV account added to the list of accounts she can access online to print out invoices. As it turned out, just in time, as BTE seems to be experiencing more than their normal number of invoicing problems.
TP is receiving more and more trade books in a smaller format. The smallest wrapper used in TP was 10". The processors suggested trying out 8" wrappers to avoid having to cut off the excess when processing these smaller books. After trying them out, the processors are enthusiastic about how much faster and easier it is to process these materials. As soon as TP can make some storage space for these 8" wrappers, Heidi will start ordering them in larger quantities since they are more cost effective in addition to being easier and less wasteful to use.
TP has received a new sample of a video case from Showcases to use for Disney videos. This is the first sample to really stand up to repeated dropping onto the corners of the case. These cases are fairly expensive. Heidi will conduct a cost study after she is back from AVL whether it would be more cost effective to use these cases than spend extra staff time on cutting down the art work on Disney videos to make them fit into the case currently in use.
MSL and most of DN have been suffering with computer problems and delays over the last week. Automation was working on the computer lines, which required MSL to turn off computers for long periods of time. When the computers were brought back up, there were lots of problems with connections. The problems seem to have been corrected.
Janet lost a good deal of data and information when her hard drive crashed last week. Fortunately, Automation had saved data from her old computer when she got a new computer 4 weeks ago. Janet only has to reconstruct files she worked on over the last month.
Library Visits
Selectors conducted a 6 month collection review at RE during the month of July. Each selector visited with staff and with Daphene Keys.
During August, selectors will conduct 6 month collection reviews of DN and SO.
During September they are scheduled for a 6 month visit to BI and an annual visit to MC.
CAT/TP Visit
Kim, Julie and Megan visited CAT/TP on July 22.
MSL is expecting Veronica for a visit next week. Kim and Elizabeth will work with her.
Pauline attended ALA in Toronto June 20-23. She attended the pre-conference describing changes for the new edition of Dewey, as well as other sessions relating to cataloging and management.
Crystal attended the Tech Support Group meeting on June 17.
Ursula visited ODL with Ruby and Sharon to look at documents to consider adding to our selection profile for next year. Ursula is working on the profile, which is due July 31. She will get it to Karen by the last week of July.
Jana and Jill attended the benefits fair on June 26.
Clyde and Crystal attended the OLA TSRT meeting on June 27.
The annual poster vote is currently going on in Cataloging; new posters will be up shortly.
The system’s annual documents visit from ODL is scheduled for August 6. Kevin Motes will come to Cataloging at about 9:45; then he, Ursula, and Pauline will go Downtown for a visit.
The release date for the Windows client for OCLC’s new cataloging interface, Connexion, has been delayed. The new target date is September/October 2003. The end of life for the current interface, Passport, has been extended indefinitely; the new date has not been announced. Pauline will get with Jim Welch to plan for migration to the Internet browser for Connexion.
With the boxes of not in system gifts for the HRC collection, storage in Cataloging is tight. The gifts cannot be worked until they can be cataloged, and the boxes cannot be emptied because there is limited space to store the materials. This makes it difficult to store boxes of transfers when they come in.
Since no Materials Services Division Managers meeting was held during June, this document contains updates on the activities of each department since the May 15 meeting.
Selectors conducted 6-month visits to CT and VI and an annual visit to WA during May.
During June selectors are making 6-month visits to ED and annual visits to CH and DC.
Janet and Karen had a follow up meeting with Mary/WA.
Selectors will plan a 6-month visit to RE during July.
Janet will conduct follow up meetings with Phil/CH and Katrina/DC during the first couple of weeks of July.
Selectors completed annual visits to the extensions.
During April an annual visit to BI and a 6-month visit to BE were completed.
Janet and Karen made a follow up visit to BI on May 8th.
Selectors will conduct 6-month visits to CT and VI during May. They will also conduct an annual visit to WA.
Materials Selection Workshop
Janet, Julie and Heidi conducted the Spring MSL Workshop.
The evaluations were very good for the workshop.
Julie has some good ideas for improvement for the fall.
The big news is the birth of Jasmine Bernal to Cataloging’s part-time page, Lacey Carr. Jasmine arrived on April 15, giving her the same birthday as Kara Giles. Mother and baby are doing fine; Lacey plans to return to work, but no word as to when yet.
Pauline is not sure how Lacey’s absence will impact processing of transfers and new-barcode materials. If the runs slow down late in the fiscal year, as they have in years past, Tech Processing will probably be able to take more. However, runs have been up in April, after having been down in March.
Ursula’s PC has been rebuilt, and all catalogers now have access to mlsCataloging.
A scanner has been installed on Veronica’s PC, so that all Technicians now have scanners.
Jana served as an Event Employee at the Read Across America celebration on March 3.
Receipt of materials has picked up slightly. On Monday, TP received over 70 boxes.
Bindery materials were returned to TP on January 24. There were 4 books that needed to be returned to the bindery due to problems. The next bindery group will be picked up by Quality Book Binding Company on March 19. Erica Burton started as the new Receiving Tech in TP on Feb. 3. Receipt of materials was fairly slow during that week which gave TP time to train her in her new job duties. Now, that TP is receiving more boxes again, she can put her new skills and knowledge to good use.
Heidi attended the very nice reception for Donna Morris on Feb. 13 at the Village Library. The band was wonderful, yet could have used a larger room to do full justice to its music. It was wonderful to see so many people from across the state attend Donna's reception.
Heidi met with staff on Feb. 12 to inform them of changes in system policies like the grievance procedure and discuss the use of library equipment/services by staff, among other things.
Heidi attended the meeting of the PR Council where upcoming advertising for the library was among the topics discussed. The next meeting will take place on March 14 at DN.
Staff members attended various system and OLA functions during December.
Veronica and Lacey, the pages working in Cataloging, were a great help during the week after Christmas, when Cataloging was short-staffed. Veronica in particular worked a large number of extra hours. Pauline appreciated Phil Tolbert’s allowing Veronica to make up hours missed in Capitol Hill during the holidays by working in Cataloging.
Karene Adkins notified Pauline on January 6 that she did not plan to return to work following the birth of her baby. The Cataloging Technician position was posted on January 10, and closes on January 23.
Pauline went to BI on January 8 to meet with Dave to discuss cataloging of a title in Japanese. He was quite helpful, and the book should be cataloged shortly.
