[Libs-Or] LTLO September 2011

[Jessica Rondema]

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[OSL Building]
Letter to Libraries Online

An Electronic Newsletter from the Oregon State Library

Volume 21, Issue 9, September 2011



Contents:
Library Board News
State Library News
Other Library News
P.S. (From the State Librarian)
Contacts at the State Library


Library Board News


Mary Beth Pearl-Gent (1944 - 2011)

State Library Board member Mary Beth Pearl-Gent passed away on August 6th after a long illness. Beth made an important contribution to improving both school and public libraries in Oregon. Before her retirement she was a teacher-librarian in several Oregon school districts. After her retirement she was a consultant, working to improve school library services in Central Oregon. In 1999 she was elected to the Deschutes Public Library District Board, the governing Board of the Deschutes Public Library. She served several terms as Chair of the Board and was still serving on the Board at the time of her death. In 2006 Governor Kulongoski appointed Pearl-Gent to a four-year term on the Oregon State Library Board of Trustees, and in 2010 he reappointed her to that post. Beth was proud of her role in strengthening the partnership between the Deschutes Public Library and schools in Deschutes County through the innovative Library Linx project. Also during her tenure, the library completed new facilities in La Pine, Sisters and East Bend. Beth was most proud of her contributions to the new Sisters Library, which serves her home community. Contributions may be made in Beth's name to the Friends of the Sisters Library<http://sistersfol.com>.

Governor Kitzhaber Appoints Susan Hathaway-Marxer to State Library Board

On August 19th, Governor Kitzhaber announced the appointment of Susan Hathaway-Marxer of Portland to the State Library Board of Trustees. She will fill the seat vacated by Cliff Trow after his retirement from the Board in July. Hathaway-Marxer has long been a library leader in Portland. She served on the Multnomah County Library Board from 1995-2003 and was Chair of the Board in her final year of service. She also served on the Board of the Friends of the Multnomah County Library from 1988 to 1993 including one year as Chair. From 2006 to 2008 she was a member of the State Library's Library Services and Technology Act Advisory Council. She currently serves on the Board of Literary Arts, Inc. Hathaway-Marxer is retired after a long career with the Port of Portland and the City of Portland. From 1991 to 2003 she was Property Manager for the City of Portland Parks and Recreation Bureau. "We are grateful to the Governor for appointing such a well-qualified citizen to serve on the State Library Board," commented State Librarian Jim Scheppke. "Susan has a great depth of knowledge of public library funding and governance issues through her work with the Multnomah County Library and is well-versed in our LSTA Grant Program through her work on the LSTA Advisory Council."

Recruitment Process Continues for the Next Oregon State Librarian

[Librarian]The State Library Board of Trustees continues to work through the plan for selecting the new Oregon State Librarian. Executive Recruitment Specialist Twyla Lawson with the Department of Administrative Services is leading the recruitment. The job announcement remained open for approximately two months in search of candidates with passion, foresight, and a drive to be the chief administrative officer of the State Library. After the announcement closed on August 15th, the applications were processed. The Screening Panel members, who will assist the Board in the selection process, held their initial meeting on August 26th to prepare materials for the upcoming interviews in mid-September. In late October, as part of the final interview process, Lawson will facilitate Stakeholder Forums for the final candidates to meet with internal and external customers. The stakeholders will have an opportunity to provide feedback regarding the candidates for the Board to consider in the final selection process. The final steps will include an Executive Session of the Board and a Public Session, after which the Board will make the final selection of the next Oregon State Librarian on October 21st.

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State Library News


Archived Webinar about U.S. History in Context & GREENR Available Online

[GALE Logo]By now you know that in August Gale added two new databases<http://listsmart.osl.state.or.us/pipermail/libs-or/2011-August/010730.html> to our statewide contract at no additional cost: U.S. History in Context and GREENR. Last month Gale offered four webinars to introduce Oregon library staff to these new resources. Now an archived version of one of those webinars is available on the Gale support sites for Oregon academic<http://www.galesupport.com/oregonacad/> and public/tribal/K12<http://galesupport.com/oregon/> libraries. For access, go to one of the support sites and click on the bubble featuring the archived webinar, which is in the column on the right. Or, click on a link called Training Info or Training Opportunities to be directed to a page with links to the archived webinar, Gale tutorials for other databases, and Gale's national webinar calendar. Questions? Contact Jennifer Maurer<mailto:jennifer.maurer at state.or.us> in Library Development at the State Library.

2011 Annual Report of the Oregon Intellectual Freedom Clearinghouse Now Available

The 2011 Annual Report is now available on the Oregon Intellectual Freedom Clearinghouse<http://www.oregon.gov/OSL/LD/intellectual.shtml> website. The report is a compendium of 17 challenges to library material in six public libraries between July 1, 2010 and June 30, 2011. The Oregon Intellectual Freedom Clearinghouse (OIFC) collects reports about formal, written challenges to library material from all types of Oregon libraries. The information is reported to OIFC by Oregon libraries on a voluntarily basis. OIFC compiles the reports from libraries into an annual report each year; all previous reports are now available online.

Send Your Student's Reading Lists to TBABS

[TBABS Logo]Teachers, Librarians, Teacher-Librarians-lend us your ears. The school year is just about to start and many of you are looking at, working with, and trying to fill school reading lists for your visually and physically impaired students. Talking Book and Braille Services has access to many titles commonly found on student reading lists. Share those lists with TBABS and we'll review our collection and make sure to have those books on hand to loan to Oregon students. We have many titles in many formats such as, digital cartridge, downloadable audio (BARD), Braille, and web-Braille. Send your reading lists to Elke Bruton<mailto:elke.bruton at state.or.us>, or to our street address here at the Oregon State Library, 250 Winter St NE, Salem, OR 97301.

2011 Public Library Statistics Collection Closes October 1

The 2011 Public Library Statistical Report is now open at collect.btol.com<http://collect.btol.com>. The statistical report is due October 1. Please email or call Ann Reed<mailto:ann.reed at state.or.us> for help early and often at 503-378-5027, or check out the FAQ<http://libdev.plinkit.org/faqs-for-state-statistical-reports>.

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Other Library News


Cultural Trust Makes Grants to Libraries

[OregonCulturalTrust]Among the $1.54 million in grants to heritage, arts, and humanities organizations announced by the Oregon Cultural Trust on July 29th were four grants for library projects:

Josephine Community Libraries, Inc., $12,000
To repair, rebuild and modernize the books and other materials in the Josephine County Libraries collections providing educational and enlightening books, multimedia materials and computerized library resources.

Columbia Gorge Arts in Education, $3,000
To support Welcome Back Old Friend, an interdisciplinary art project for students to celebrate the re-opening of the Hood River County Library. Students will work in 5-8 day residencies to explore and create work related to concept of losing, then regaining an old friend.

Shaw Historical Library, $5,000
To update and revise the library's archival collections management procedures through consultations with a professional archivist who will also advise on integrating procedures into the library's daily workflows.

The Library Foundation, $4,000
To bring young adult author Matt de la Pena to Multnomah County Library in October 2011 to work with 900 teens from 11 at risk high schools, partnering with teachers to deliver books to each classroom, and including free public programs, an evening lecture by de la Pena and programs that explore and celebrate Hispanic culture.

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P.S. (From the State Librarian)



[Jim Scheppke]I started writing this column soon after I became Oregon State Librarian in 1991. I haven't counted them all up, but they must total well over 200 by now. I'm never at a loss for something to write about. Remarkable things about Oregon libraries come across my desk every day.

I have often sung the praises of the Multnomah County Library in this space. Not because they are, by far, the largest public library in Oregon, and I need to stay in their good graces, but because they are an outstanding public library, arguably the best in the U.S.

Here is the latest evidence of that from the 2011 Public Library Data Service Statistical Report compiled and published by the Public Library Association. If you look at Section IV you will find that only one library in the U.S. checked out more items than Multnomah County Library in 2009-10. That would be the New York Public Library. They checked out 24.1 million items. That's about 1.4 million more than MCL's 22.7 million check-outs. King County Library in Washington came in third with 22.4 million check-outs.

But MCL's 2nd place finish in the library circulation race is, of course, remarkable for the fact that the New York Public Library serves 3.3 million people with 89 locations. King County Library serves 1.3 million people with 46 locations and six bookmobiles. MCL serves only about 725,000 people from 18 locations (they have since added one) and yet their circulation comes up only 1.4 million short of NYPL's. How amazing is that?

In fairness it should be noted that the Cuyahoga County Public Library, serving suburban Cleveland, Ohio, circulated 20.4 million items from their 28 branches. And since they serve only 568,000 people, they took the circulation per capita crown away from MCL with 35.9 vs. MCL's 31.4, good for second place in the large library division.

But still, Cuyahoga has many more branches and probably a more affluent and well-educated population, since they don't serve Cleveland (it has its own public library).

As the table in Section IV of the Report shows, renewals have a lot to do with off-the-charts circulation. I think it's interesting that PLA now collects data on renewals. A liberal renewal policy, and making it easy for patrons to renew, as MCL does, can sure give a boost to circulation. About 52% of MCL's circulation is renewals. About 43% of Cuyahoga's circulation is renewals. Only 22% of New York Public Library's circulation is renewals.

To my way of thinking a liberal renewal policy, and making it easy to renew, is just good customer service. To make it work you need to have an ample collection development budget that adds more high-demand books to the collection instead of making slow readers like me return their books before they are read. There are few things in this world more irritating to me than being forced to either return a library book that I haven't finished or pay a fine. What a terrible choice, and a terrible user experience.

But if you are one of the fortunate ones to live in Multnomah County you probably don't have to make this choice very often. Which has something to do with why the percentages of "yes" votes in the last three five-year levy elections in Multnomah County have looked like this: 53%, 58%, 62%. - Jim Scheppke

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Contacts


Oregon State Library

Library Development: 503-378-2525, MaryKay Dahlgreen<mailto:marykay.dahlgreen at state.or.us>, Ferol Weyand<mailto:FerolWeyand at oslmail.osl.state.or.us>, Darci Hanning<mailto:darci.hanning at state.or.us>, Ann Reed<mailto:ann.reed at state.or.us>, Jennifer Maurer<mailto:jennifer.maurer at state.or.us>, Katie Anderson<mailto:katie.anderson at state.or.us>.

Talking Book and Braille Services: 503-378-5389, Susan Westin<mailto:susan.b.westin at state.or.us>.[OSL Logo]

Government Research Services: 503-378-5030, Robert Hulshof-Schmidt<mailto:robert.hulshof-schmidt at state.or.us>.

State Librarian: 503-378-4367, Jim Scheppke<mailto:jim.b.scheppke at state.or.us>.

LTLO Editor: 503-378-2464, Jessica Rondema<mailto:jessica.rondema at state.or.us>.

Letter to Libraries Online is published monthly by the Oregon State Library. It is available free of charge and is published only in electronic form on the publications page on the Oregon State Library's homepage: http://www.oregon.gov/OSL.

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