Board of Trustees: Meeting Minutes from September 8, 2014
Morrill Memorial Board of Trustees
Meeting Minutes-September 8, 2014Present: Curt Albee, Cindy Binzen, Martin Frank, Danette Harris, Rachel Kurland, Rebecca Seibel, Carol Wilson
1. Changes to the agenda for this evening: none
2. Secretary’s Report: The minutes from the July 7, 2014 meeting were accepted as written. Danette thanked Carol for taking the minutes in July.
(Note: There was not a Board meeting in August.)
3. Librarian’s Report:
A. Curt was thanked for taking a chair from the basement and selling
it for $50.
B. Rachel is continuing to sell books that are donated on-line.
C. The children’s programs went well this summer, especially the
Monday evening programs. There were 41 attendees at the Simon
Brooks story telling program.
D. Story time has not been well attended. Should this program be cut?
Could it be done somewhere else, such as the café or at the
preschool? Should it be only offered once per month or on a different day of the week?
E. 31 students kept reading logs this summer. The Friends gave students who read three or more books a gift certificate to the Norwich Book Store.
F. Emily is starting an after school program on September 18. She
is asking an 8th grader to help her with this.
G. The balance in the Turrell Grant fund is just over $2400.
H. Gus Speth has a memoir coming out soon and will do a reading at
the library on November 12.
I. Gregory Maguire also has a new book and Rebecca may ask him to
do a reading.
J. Christine Bartlett is interested in setting up a program sponsored
by the VT Humanities Council sometime in February, March or April.
Rebecca and Christine will meet next week to discuss this.
K. Cindy and Curt got the shelves in the basement back into place.
Carol volunteered to help organize the shelves after Rebecca has
gone through them. Cindy volunteered to cover the circulation desk
so that Rebecca and Carol can work together on this project.
L. Rebecca needs help in organizing the file cabinets in the basement
and she also needs help with shredding some boxes of papers.
M. Rebecca will be attending a LUV Coop meeting next week and a
Library World meeting on October 17.
N. There will be a Friends meeting on September 17. At this meeting,
Rebecca is finalizing a list of requests for the next meeting, possibly to include financial help with a number of items, such as DVDs, materials for the after-school program, postage, etc.
O. There was a request from a community member to use the library
for Fantasy Football but this event did not happen.
P. If anyone has suggestions for new library volunteers, please let
Rebecca know.
Q. Rebecca requested that the topic of snow removal be placed on the
next agenda.
R. Recently, a patron fell at the library. Rebecca requested that the
liability insurance for the library get examined. It was discussed
whether or not the coverage should be increased and if an umbrella
policy should be added. Marty will call for specific information.
4. Report from The Friends: The next meeting will be on September 17. Their annual meeting will be held on October 23 and they will be hosting Meg Lukens.
5. Treasurer’s Report:
A. The Profit and Loss Statement dated September 4 was distributed
and examined.
B. One area where spending is higher than normal is postage. Rebecca
will redo the request form for ILL materials to include information on postage.
C. We now have a “pay as you go protection plan” with Rymes for the
heating oil and currently have a credit of about $400.
D. The negative amount on the bottom line will soon be lessened by an
$8500 check from the town, a check from The Friends and the
reimbursement from Efficiency Vermont. The remaining negative
balance is from recent special projects.
6. Other business:
A. The Open Meeting Law was discussed and Cindy expressed that
Emily has been very helpful with this. An agenda has to be posted
at 3 places in town at least 48 hours ahead of the meeting. Minutes
need to be posted on the website and will be available for perusal in
a binder at the library.
1. It was decided that the agenda will be posted at the
library, the Town Clerk’s office and Coburn’s Store as
well as on the library website.
B. Carol brought up the issue of using emails to circulate information
and to make decisions. Cindy read from the VT Department of
Libraries publication entitled “Open Meeting Law FAQ” that email
is for the distribution of information only (e.g. creating the agenda)
and not for decisions. It was noted that, for a special board meeting,
the agenda must be warned and posted 24 hours ahead and, for a
regular meeting, 48 hours ahead. Minutes shall be posted within 5
days on the website and shall be labeled “draft minutes”. Cindy
will send information on posting to Danette.
C. There was continued discussion about reorganizing the basement.
Rebecca will organize first and then will contact Carol and Cindy
to help out.
D. Buildings and Grounds
1. The committee has not met lately since there has been no
need.
2. Curt will ask Mark Green to scrape and paint the railing
on the front porch.
3. On weatherization, the foam insulation was done by John
Birch from VT Foam Insulation. He recently tested the library
and found that the efficiency had increased by about 13%.
Also, weather stripping was added to the attic. Mr. Birch
will give the report to Efficiency VT and then hopefully we
will then receive a check from them.
4. Curt checked the fireplace damper and found it to be askew
causing some leakage. He feels that this is a major source of
heat loss. If the fire place is not going to be used, he will
tighten the damper.
5. Cindy said that Rocky Fuller has kindly offered to do
gutter cleaning and Curt kindly agreed to help.
E. Marty wrote a thank you letter to the library volunteers that
appeared in the Strafford News and the Strafford list serv.
F. Marty will write a thank you letter for the grant from the Mascoma Foundation.
G. Sterling Quality Cleaners will be coming to clean the carpets
on September 30. The cost is projected to be $187. Marty kindly
agreed to move the furniture, if needed.
H. Cindy and Rachel met to discuss reviewing the library policies and
an informational packet for Trustees. This will be discussed next
month. There are several policies that the VT Dept. of Libraries
suggests for libraries to have, so these will be reviewed first. Deidre Dennis has mentioned that she would be willing to look at policies.
I. The monthly duty for September is furnace cleaning, but, since
the furnace was cleaned by Rymes in 2013, a cleaning may be
skipped for this year.
7. Next meeting: October 6, 2014 at 7:00pm at the library.
Respectfully submitted,
Danette Harris, secretary
