Present: As attached.

1. CALL TO ORDER /WELCOME - Marjorie Hill-Devine. Marjorie called the meeting to order at 10:05.

2. APPROVAL OF MINUTES. The Minutes from the December 21, 2000 meeting were voted on. Tom Cesarz made a motion to approve the Minutes; John Beauregard seconded the motion. The vote was unanimous.

3. TREASURER’S REPORT - Thomas Scully. Tom reported that the audit for Fiscal Year 2000 was complete and was more involved because of the federal grant funds that were received for the new system. There were some procedural issues that weren’t completed with the grant due to not having the latest federal regulations. Tom also reported the budget is 44% expended. John Beauregard made a motion to accept the treasurer’s report; Bonnie Strong seconded the motion. The vote was unanimous.

4. MANAGER’S REPORT - Ronald Gagnon. Ron reported on the first year of the new system. He stated it has been a learning process and now things are moving forward. Ron reported on what is upcoming. Introductory sessions for the serials module has been scheduled, patrons services and Intra-NOBLE lending using Picklist will be implemented in February, and a meeting for EBSCO enhancements. Also there will be a Town Meeting on Statistics the end of January. The purpose of the meeting is to get input from the libraries as to what they need to know and want to show on reports. There have been some roundtable sessions going on also. Upcoming conferences NOBLE staff will be attending are a Consortia Manager’s Meeting in April, III Annual User’s Group in May, and ALA Annual Conference in June.

Ron reported on the E-rate funding request for FY 2002. He passed around a handout with a breakdown. There are three phases to E-rate funding; telecommunications and Internet are the top priority, and internal connections are a secondary priority. Last year NOBLE received funding for telecommunications and Internet. We received funding for internal connections once and that was in Year Two. Last year NOBLE received just under $71,000 in funding, which is approximately what is being requested this year between telecommunications and Internet. An issue that has come up with Dimension Data is in regard to the Network Monitoring Contract. The annual cost for this service is $14,000 and NOBLE was informed that the cost is going to be increased by factor of 4 for the coming fiscal year. Ron and Martha will be meeting with Dimension Data to discuss this further. Ron discussed the filtering issue. Congress passed a requirement that libraries that receive E-rate or LSTA funding must have some Internet filtering. This won’t impact college libraries as far as E-rate, but it would for LSTA funds. The details of this issue haven’t been worked out yet and most likely won’t for a while. Ron will keep libraries informed.

Elizabeth Thomsen. Elizabeth passed around a handout on upcoming meetings that’s from the "What’s Happening" page on the Staff Information System. She just returned from ALA Mid-Winter conference and talked about the III product demos and the Consortia Meeting coming up. Elizabeth discussed some database items that are being worked on. NOBLE staff is in the process of adding bib level formats to bib records to be used for limiting in the web catalog, Milcirc and GuiCat. She has been working with the Database Quality Working Group to come up with a policy on how to handle the "annual" type books, such as, travel books, college guides, and test manuals. Also Elizabeth has been working with the Electronic Resources Working Group on continuing to load EBSCO records. Several things are being worked on to help control scoping. Elizabeth stated that the Boston Region has contracted for a group of collections of public library oriented netLibrary titles. These titles should be available to all Massachusetts libraries that are members of regions possibly February 1^st. The contract is through EBSCO, but access to

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the titles will be through netLibrary via the NOBLE catalog. Elizabeth also reported that the first part of MilCat would be coming out soon. She saw the demo at Mid-Winter ALA and reported it has enhancements for database clean up. A part-time employee was hired, Lois Dishmon, to assist in cataloging.

Elizabeth stated that effective February 1^st when patrons can begin logging into their accounts, this is also the start of My Millennium. Once a patron is logged into their patron record and they click on the button that says "Search The Catalog", they are searching the catalog in a "logged in" state and the system already knows who they are.

Elizabeth reported on training. Create Lists Training has been ongoing; we look forward to moving Create Lists into the Millennium interface soon. There is more information on the Staff Information System on the Reports and Statistics page. Help Sessions are scheduled for the end of January and end of February. There were two Collection Management Roundtable sessions. EBSCO has had many enhancements over the past year. There is a meeting on February 27^th to review the EBSCO enhancements. Elizabeth also stated she was appointed to EBSCO’s Software Advisory Council. Also coming up in April and May will be hands on training searching sessions in EBSCO. There will be a Serials Meeting on March 7^th, a Web Catalog Meeting on March 21^st, and two Roundtable Sessions; Reader’s Advisory on March 29^th and Multilingual Services on April 10^th. These roundtable sessions are for libraries to get together to discuss a similar issues or topics. NOBLE staff will be available, but are not running the discussion group.

Martha Driscoll. Martha reported that the mail server came back from VA Linux. It was sent back for repair of a hardware problem. She has more set up to do before the changeover, everyone will be getting new passwords. A trainer with PC SYSCOM will be coming out for three days to train Martha, Michele and George on LANDesk Management Suite. On February 12^th the Picklist software will go into effect. This is when library staff places holds on materials and libraries print their list. The list should be printed at least once a day to check if that item is on shelf, and if so, they would send it to the requesting library. This eliminates hold requests via e-mail and automates the process. There was a combined Circ and ILL meeting on January 11^th to show how this worked. Instructions will also be on the Staff Information System. There was some discussion as to what library would get the credit for a circ if one library checks out a book in their library that is owned by another library. Also there was a discussion as to how long an item will stay on libraries Picklist without any action being taken before it moves down the list to the next available library. It was suggested that an item would be on the list for three days to allow for libraries that are closed on weekends to have a chance to check their list on Monday’s. Martha explained that if an item that is requested from your library is missing, then that library would have to mark it as "missing" so the system knows to move down the list to the next library. Patron holds won’t be available initially, likely in a couple of months depending on the success of the rollout and Executive Board approval.

Electronic Resources Working Group - As stated earlier Elizabeth reported that ERWG is still continuing to work on loading the EBSCO titles.

Database Quality Working Group - Tom Scully reported that there haven’t been any changes since the last meeting. There is another meeting coming up.

New Members Committee - Tom Scully reported at their first meeting they discussed criteria on how to evaluate potential new members. Also the committee is discussing having Associate memberships. Ron will draft a description of what an Associate membership would be. The thought is that it would be

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libraries that don’t routinely circulate. Once the description is done and the committee gets approval of an Associate membership they will evaluate a list of potential members.

Brochure Committee - Marjorie reported that the design for the new brochure was awarded to Extra Mile of Pepperell. They have experience doing work for libraries and their chief graphic artist is a librarian. Four designers were interviewed and the committee decided Extra Mile could best provide what NOBLE wants for a brochure.

John Beauregard stated that many of their "series" are not indexed in the catalog that should be. Elizabeth stated that if they have a "490" in the field then they are not indexed, those with a "440" are indexed series. She asked John to send her some examples and she would look into it.

There was also some discussion on the patron services that will begin on February 1^st and the PIN cards that will be issued. Dennis Kelley asked if there was some information libraries could have to give out to patrons explaining what the service is and how to use it. Martha said she could get something together.

Martha did an overhead presentation showing access and links on the Staff Information System on how to run statistics. She also put instructions on how to run some web management reports there.

The meeting was running late, therefore this topic was postponed.

8. DISCUSSION OF INTRA-NOBLE LENDING- Marjorie Hill-Devine. Marjorie discussed a chart that was a compilation of an ILL Network Transfer survey that was done a year ago. It showed what libraries would and would not lend to other libraries. This is to be used in conjunction with the Picklist. Ron explained that a new survey would be faxed out for libraries to update.

Ron talked about a statewide virtual catalog project that may be coming up. A grant went out a couple of years ago to the Boston Library Consortia to work with the Boston Public Library for a statewide virtual catalog. It involves using third party software through Epixtech Resource Sharing Software. Once the whole project is phased in it will allow libraries to do one search and search all of the automated systems, as well as Masscat the Regions are putting together for the schools and special libraries. For the automated on-line systems it will identify in one search if a given work is available anywhere in the state. It will also indicate the availability and automatically place holds. Implementation will be rolled out network by network. The way it will be phased in is that first you will be able to search statewide, then placing holds statewide would come along after. NOBLE would be involved in the Z39 type of searching. Marjorie asked how this will effect NOBLE’s contract with NMRLS for the Interlibrary Loan Center. Ron explained that there will still be a need for the ILL Center because not all libraries will participate and not all materials will be found in state.

9. ADJOURNMENT. John Beauregard made a motion to adjourn, Tom Cesarz seconded the motion. The meeting was adjourned at 12:15.

Respectfully submitted,

Mary Rose Quinn

Secretary