July 2019

Meinders Library Board Meeting

7/10/19

  • Call to Order
  • Community Concerns
  • Minutes from prior meeting
  • Financial Report
  • Director’s Report
  • Statistics/Metrics Report
  • Old Business
    1. Literacy program (Tabled to Sept)
    2. Branding update
    3. Driving community visibility of Library
      1. Parade recap
      2. Other ideas
    4. Health insurance for FT staff
      1. Discuss options to assist here and finance it.
      2. July 23rd – Commissioner meeting.
  • New Business
    1. Policy Review – Final policies that need to be adopted.
    2. New Members
    3. Director goals – how can board help
      1. Survey
      2. Volunteer hours
  • Announcements
  • Adjourn

 

Meinders Library

July 10, 2019 Board Minutes

Meeting was called to order at 5:16 pm by Chair Kyle. Members present: Kyle Caskey, Evan Schiller, Pat Weets, Amy Nelson, Jody Wacker, Monica Sullivan. Absent: Justin Schroyer and Sharon Wolff.

Community concerns- none

Evan motioned, Pat seconded to approve June board minutes.

Financial report: Jody is currently working with Jacque Kennedy to clean up the end of fiscal year report. She will distribute to the board when it is completed. We have about $5000 left of the State Farm grant. Evan indicated that the county may be changing timelines for budget submissions and that Plum Creek would be requesting an increase of funding for all libraries in the system.

Director’s Report: We are still uncertain who will be staffing the school library this school year. We are waiting to hear on the Monogram grant which we hope will help us cover continuing the newly launched Code Club throughout the school year. With support from Ann Miller and others, we have submitted an application to be named The Best Small Library. We are finalists for the “We Are Water” traveling exhibit. We will interview with them next Wednesday, July 17 2-4 pm. If we are selected, we will need to host 4 events before, during, and after hosting the exhibit. We need partners to help us accomplish this. Split Rock Creek State Park is already on board for one event.

Metrics: Initial checkouts still continue to be low in our YTD goal. STEAM kits are in the process of being compiled, catalogued, and ready for check out. Our social media presence continues to grow and gain visibility.

Old Business: Literacy Program continues to be on hold until September. Branding update: the first prototypes of promo materials (letter head, name tags, business cards, etc.) were not quite as dynamic throughout as we were hoping. Also it seems the book part of the branding gets a little lost in the smaller scale. We were presented with adjustments and selected option 3. Parade recap: we gave out all the candy and got quite a number of the cards back (possibly 10%). We selected our Kindle winner and he was very appreciative. Further steps in community visibility: Jody will speak at the Women’s Connection this week. Evan suggested we post the video that had been created publicly. It was decided to hold that until after the award announcement was made. We continued our discussion about increasing the library’s income in order to better support benefits for our employees. Our hope is to encourage the county commissioners to increase the funding support of the library. We discussed potential candidates to replace Kyle on the board. Jody has provided surveys to 65 patrons and 28 have been returned. Customer service has strong rankings as well as materials, technology, and programming.

We thank Chair Kyle Caskey for his service to the board.

Our next meeting will be Wednesday, August 7 at 5:15 pm. Meeting adjourned 6:29 pm.

 

MEINDERS LIBRARY DIRECTOR’S REPORT

July 2019

  1. Programs
    1.  Events:
      1. Code Club (21 coders)
      2. Digital Escape Room- in response to an inquiry for our DIY workshop, we created a digital escape room leading up to the Water Tower Festival. Every day we have someone solve the puzzles. It’s been a fun way to connect with a new kind of escapee while celebrating our town. Further, we offered a bonus e-book sign up for anyone who completes the tasks. This will run through July 1 when we draw for the free Kindle.
      3. June 12 Ventriloquist James Wedgwood (39)
      4. June 19 DIY Escape Room Workshop (6)
    2.  Upcoming Events:
      1. July 1 @10:30am Pint Size Polka
      2. July 15-19 Library Camp ages 8-12
      3. July 21 @ 3:00pm Twin Cities Sisters In Crime “Where History Meets Mystery”
      4. August 5-10 closed for cleaning and maintenance
      5. August 12-17 Escape Room (times TBA)
      6. September 28 from 10am-1pm) Mark Moran Antiques Appraisal
  1. Staff: Diane Scotting issued her resignation effective June 28. Part time help is very difficult to maintain, as we can’t compensate well for the commitment we need. I will be re-evaluating all staff hours to see what we can do to make the upcoming months easier.
  2. Branding: we continue to work with Pipestone Publishing on a cohesive promotional package.
  3. Grants: In addition to the Monogram Foods grant for code club, we applied for and have been selected as a semifinalist for “We Are Water MN”. This traveling exhibit will have 6 host sites for 2020. The next phase is a site visit to the library and an interview. We will be looking for programming partners in case we are a finalist. See attached info.
  4. Ann Miller has been putting together an application for the library as one of the nation’s Best Small Libraries. She has employed help from a variety of local resources to create a unique submission package that includes letters of recommendation (attached), a video (thanks to a drone from the sheriff’s office), and a comprehensive narrative of all we do at the library. Jen Zupp has been helping with the technical side of things, while Monica Sullivan has put in a handful of hours on the writing portion of it.
  5. Our inaugural parade appearance was a success thanks to a slew of fearless volunteers who dressed as literary characters. Pat Weets secured a “Chitty Chitty Bang Bang” car which carried Pat and our volunteer, Mary Lue Huntsman. Mary Lue, also a PAFL member, spends a lot of time volunteering at the library.
  6. Volunteers: we continue to utilize volunteers for projects that help us remain more efficient.
  7. As is typical for summer, we are super busy, including a visit from Herman Meinders’ sister. She was greatly appreciative of the thank you letters we put together from patrons this spring.
  8. School:
    1. I have been asked to provide input for the new elementary school library.
    2. We don’t know who will provide MS/HS library services this year, but whoever does will need extensive training to get ready for the start of the school year.
  9. Customer Service Survey: we have started handing out questionnaires.