Metro East Sun

Belleville Public Library Board of Trustees met November 9. 

Here is the minutes as provided by the board::

I. Call to order and safety instructions: Board Vice President Mary Smith called the meeting to order at 6:30 p.m. and reviewed directions for evacuation and/or safety concerns with all present.

                                    Present:          Andy Guy                                        Excused:      Carol Keeley

                                                           Mary Karban

                                                           Catherine Kreher

                                                           Rhonda Ross

                                                           Mary Smith

                                                           Mary Stiehl

                                                           Helen Thompson

                                                          Victoria Weygandt

Also present: Leander Spearman, Library Director and Angela Riley, Library Part-Time Administrative Assistant.

II. Public Comments: None

III. Approval of Minutes: Catherine Kreher moved to accept minutes of the October 2017 Board Meeting. Motion was seconded by Victoria Weygandt. Minutes were approved.

IV. Policy: None

V. Property, Equipment and Services: Leander Spearman reported that we have run into some issues with our current hotspot provider, Verizon. Therefore, after review and comparison, we have switched to T-Mobile. The T-Mobile price is $30 which saves us $10 per device. We will reissue the devices in a few days. We now have on hand approximately 95 Verizon devices that will not be in use. We will contact Verizon to see if the units are sold, will they activate them?

We will begin circulating the chromebooks in January.

The Belleville Public Library is partnering with O’Fallon Public Library, Centralia Public library District, Glen Carbon Public Library and SIU-Edwardsville to launch a community and business education workshop program called Library Workshops. Rod Deutschmann is the founder and director of the program and certificate programs will be backed by SIU-Edwardsville. This program will promote Success, fill the gap left by community colleges and will bring more people to the Library.

     Attendees do not pay

      Sponsoring Library pays $50 per course

      Program Director and Library Director have plans to recruit additional sponsors

         and create ways of recognition for sponsorship

     Classes will initially be held at Main Library (Skype is a future possibility)

      Lunch and Learn Open House will be held in January 2018

      Pre-Launch classes: Holiday Portrait 12/7/17 – Small Business 12/16/17 – Photography 01/17/18

The Main Library will be a stop this year for the Annual Gingerbread Cookie Day Walk.

VI. Personnel/Legal: Leander Spearman reported on current and projected staff changes and the effect that the current budget constraints and staff departures will possibly have on operations. It was stated that the budget does not really allow for overtime for FT Employees and PT Employees are already working extra hours. Volunteers are not an option.

Supervisors will meet next week to discuss. Worst case scenario, we would have to temporarily close West Branch and move that staff to Main Branch or curtail evening hours. Neither is good.

We are assuming that most changes are due to retirement which also means that these employees are most likely the highest paid employees. The availability of these funds to our budget will not reflect until the next budget year.

He has spoken to the Mayor about the budget situation and has been granted tentative permission to fill a FT position pending the pay-out for retiring employee Carol Kirby. He also has permission to fill the vacant PT position at the West Branch.

VII. Finance: Leander Spearman Reported that we received word from the State Library that it is highly unlikely that we will receive our 2016-2017 per-capita grant funds until after we submit the current per-capita. The per-capita amount has decreased from $50,000.00 to $37,000.00. Fund have been allocated to us but not disbursed.

Due to the upcoming Veterans Day Holiday, the accounting department did request for the itemized bills to be submitted ahead of the meeting. Therefore, a general overview of bills was presented.

Finance report was read by Mary Smith. Mary Smith moved to pay the bills. The motion was seconded and approved. A roll call vote was taken. The motion carried.

VIII. Fundraising/Foundations/Promotion/Marketing:

IX. Library Reports: Enclosed with information packets.

X. Old Business:

      We are yet collecting recipes

      We have not spoken to anyone concerning the Mural Project

      Leander Spearman is our connection with the Homeless

XI. Closed Session: None

XII. New Business: IHLS received $3,000,000.00; IT Assistant, Member Consultant, PartTime Grant Position, Chris Dowdy etc.

XIII. Adjourn: Motion was made by Mary Smith and seconded to adjourn. Motion carried. The November meeting adjourned at 7:42 p.m. The next meeting of the Library Board of Directors will be held Thursday December 14, 2017 at 6:30. at the Main Library.

http://www.belleville.net/AgendaCenter/ViewFile/Minutes/_11092017-1570