Library Board - Regular Meeting

All right, I call this meeting to order and we'll start with some attendance. Library director Jennifer Reil Heidi Hoffman here, board member Kathle, board member Kathy Ryan here, member Sarah Miller here, Ian Marks here, and then we have our seaside friends and foundation representatives. Leah Ga. Thank you and myself. Um, any changes to the agenda. What about the approval for last month's minutes? Do I have a motion on approved? Second. Perfect. Minutes are approved. And community engagement. What has everyone been hearing about the library this month? I heard that the writing workshop which was actually and I have friends with the person who taught the workshop and she really enjoyed it excited that anybody else my granddaughter went to the teen something where they put I don't know exactly running but um she said she had a good time. She said there weren't anybody kids her age but um I heard from Marian that there are sometimes kids her age. How old is she? She is 12. She's in she's going into the seventh grade. All right. And then reports our assistant director reports. Yeah. So I've um attached that. Think I didn't pick one for myself. excited. Uh so we are trying out the new

format. You know what we um talked last time about what you would like to see from the reports. Um so we're trying something out. If you have feedback about um what's included here or if you'd like more or less or different, let me know. Um that's one of the things we sort of changing up the um the format of the report. So you can see um he's included um the program statistics for all of April and as across you know all of all um and then just some highlights. Uh so he will Josh for staff meetings weekly will give a quick update of what's gone on the week before. So it's always interesting to vary or less attended. Um so report about the board game night and um and film screening. Uh this one yeah this was a this one made him a little bit nervous. So we had Mike Seville. He was going to do the intro and the outro when we had a scheduling conflict. So he couldn't do the outro. So he set Josh up with how to lead it. So I didn't get to participate. So I don't know how it went. But he seemed confident that it went well and positive experience. So is there a word such as outro? I don't know. I figured, you know, it's now on the Zoom. I'll take it. Question. Sorry. Yes. Should I are these going to be posted with the minutes or do these need to be I I can just I can either incorporate them, you know, like you jot down your

notes and I can either incorporate them as part of the minutes if that would be helpful. What do you What do you think would be helpful? So, I guess we should talk about where stuff goes, where it lives to me. Um, yes. Uh, on the report that I'm on, I'm now secretary. Um, and I have an ED report and a operations manager report. And I just have them send me their notes and I include that into the board or meeting notes. Okay. separate it. Attach. Yeah. So, we can just um do the framework and then I can slide this part in and then if there's any sort of I'll write down some notes too. There's additional notes that good question. Thank you. Yeah. And of course you can now see uh our main art show went up uh in frenzy. We were um Marion and I went up to the uh multicultural night up at the school and all the art was on display in the library and quickly took it down just in the um at least the librarian but he did his student teaching in the art classes. So brought all the art down, brought it over the Thursday and he was here till 7 with Josh and the challenge, but it got it all figured out. We were super excited that it's a really fun show and then you know definitely check out in the hallway too. It just feels so I love that the high school artist. Are the ceramics and things in the case also quite good? Yeah. And I was just up at the high school this morning and I

noticed that right by the front door if you come in is where the ceramics room is. Yeah. So that's what's going on. is the assistant librarian the one that does the book book summer reading you know um for adults or kids uh Marian does that yeah so we've got when does that start so the kickoff is June 1st well you can start signing up as of June 1st uh the official kickoff is June 10 maybe and in South America. Don't care about that. But don't put that in a minute. Oopsies. Um and what's it called? Just summer reading program. Yeah. And the um the theme this year is level up at your library. So it's game related. Um which we actually did games last year, but I think it is the 7th. Yeah, June 7th will be the kickoff. Um that'll be here at the library of activities and snacks and bubbles and all sorts of things. Um and it is of course all ages. So we're uh looking to create an online um registration for kids and teens and adults. ramp up course and get some good prices to hand.

All right, Leah, will you share the foundation report with us? Sure. Um, Slith S LF keep trying to say it right before it used to be what? Fossil felation. It was split. Yeah, we never split. Terrible. Anyway, we really kick off tomorrow morning. Um, we're hosting the Good Morning Seaside here at the library. It'll be an opportunity not only to share the story of Friends and Foundation, but also the library because as we were talking about our program tomorrow, um we're the ones that just provide the money and the library staff does all the things. I mean, we provide the money for the movies and summer reading and all of those kind of things, but we don't carry them out. The library staff carries them out. So, we figure it'll be a great opportunity just to share more stories about the library as well as encouraging people to participate in the um there's the website in the friends and foundation and we are going to really kick off a membership drive and I hope all of you will consider joining um you'll have opportunities to join at the individual, business, nonprofit um sponsorship and even the um lifetime membership at $1,000, which we know we have at least one lifetime membership that's going to kick us off in that. Probably two. Yes. And yeah, there's the membership levels. And um we've got magnets and buttons that we'll be giving away. We're developing our book bags. Um making something that's reasonable because book bags have gotten really expensive and so we haven't purchased any yet. But if you do give at

the those top two, the business or no, keep going down. Yeah, the business or the patron level or the need um thousand gift, you will be a book bag of some sort or another. Just haven't ordered yet. Um and we have completed transferring all of our finances into the the accounts that are now together at um US Bank. Um, we closed out our foundation account, which is it was at Lewis and Clark. So, we now have what we're really referring to as the endowment account for the frozen foundation. Um, a little over $33,000, which is a nice chunk of change. The one of the concepts we're kind of revising a little bit is that that money will remain there until we get a lot more money and then we'll use the interest from that for library programs. If something comes up that we really need to expend that money on for the library, then that can be part of a discussion. But our policy that we're developing is that we don't just use the endowment money for normal every year kind of things that that money will really come from the um kind of the friends part of it, the bookstore and also the memberships. Um in your last month's minutes, I noticed it said um at last count was 250 members. At last time that we actually took memberships, which was a couple of years ago for the friends, it was at about 250 members. At this point, technically there are zero members. Um, but hopefully after tomorrow, because I haven't joined, so there'll be at least two or three of us that will join at that point. Um, we will our our goal is that 300 members. And I think with having had 250 before, I think that's a

reasonable goal that we'll be able to reach. But right now, because we haven't managed members for a while, the friends not managed members for a while, we really have zero. But we have the count, we have the lists, and so all those people will be hearing from us and encouraging them to to join the new um slip. And so I invite you to come tomorrow morning. Um, we'll be out in the main part of the library. Uh, we're stealing some of your annual report slides for the presentation. I think Ta talked with you today about it and uh um it'll be a good opportunity to promote the library and that's that's what we're all about. We don't do anything. We just help support the library who who then supports the community. That's kind of our philosophy is we don't we don't support the library. support the community and I think that's a really important designation that people understand is that you know the library is is how we do it but the library supports the community and oops so that's kind of what we're aiming at. So anybody have any questions or anything? I believe. Yeah. $20 for an individual, 40 for a household. If you're part of a nonprofit, $50 and business, 100 and a patron, 250. And then that ever wonderful 250 or 1,000 lifetime. But you have to be a person to do a lifetime membership. You cannot be a business. We don't recognize corporations as people. So, um, very wise. Yeah. Yeah. And are those per year? Yes. Okay. Yes, those are per year. And you're going to be able to sign up right from the website? I believe the website is active right now. Um, seaside library

f something. Yeah. Seaside library fff.org. Yeah. And so you can join tonight and be our first members. And uh we're still working out a few little soft touch, but um um it's, you know, it's any process is it's a process. So, but I think it's it's good. And Christy Weights, many of you know her, she's done all the design work for us and has just done a fantastic job. I mean, we love our logo and she's done all the work on this and she's very, very talented. So, we're we're really fortunate to have her. I guess otherwise our stuff would not look this good. The colors, are they really? And you can see the button that Jennifer has buttons that we'll be giving out, stickers that we'll be giving out tomorrow. And we'll turn some of those buttons to the magnets, too. And then on your website, is there a button just to make donations? Donate. There you go. Donate button. Good. All right. Again, some of that is is being developed. We're still working with the volunteers that work with the bookstore to work out how those things are going to work out. We're hoping that we'll be able to have a bookstore um be able to take credit cards for I'm just going to say we're like, don't give me a credit card for a dollar. Um you know, that kind of thing. But uh sometimes people that's all they got. So and since everything is free they came to us sale and I'll tell you a funny story about that. Last time I went to the United Kingdom I got for I got pounds you know bank. This time I never needed cash or anything. Nothing. Not to get on a bus, not to get on a train. Not

to use the pay toilets. They have little scanners at the pay toilets. for 30 and you just charge 30. You're going next week and so it's good to know. You don't need some cash. But and a lot of places won't take that. They just want, you know, so yeah, it's the first trip I've ever know about the bathroom. Yeah. Because last time, you know, you're taking like a half. Yeah. So it's too late and then Yeah. Yeah, I think we'll eventually get to that point in this country too, but I'm surprised they haven't already of all the countries in the world for this one to not jump on the pay toilets. There's all sorts of people talk about, you know, dollar say legal tangent. I disagree with that, but you know, we're all about profit here. It's like the privacy thing though. So your credit card now we know where you went to the bathroom track because I want to know how much I spent on toilets. Well, thank you. Thank you for that bit of information. So anyway, um we're really looking forward to to tomorrow and stop and pick up some food tonight. Though nobody ever eats too much of those things in the morning. I swear they've already had their oatmeal before they come. That's because morning people are funny that way. Morning people are not a morning. So anyway, that's all I've got. Great. And the library director report. Thank you. So who did the print out there? Um thanks.

Um so broke it out into buckets here. Partnerships in community engagement. As you know, we had the one side events last month and um was sort of surprisingly successful. But I think to be able to get between five and nine people at a at a book discussion. Um certainly um you know we have that crazy weather day. We have still five folks in here. So that was it was a fun inaugural event. I look forward to continuing it in the future. And Kathy mentioned that the book just won the piller today. Oh no. There we go. And as I alluded to mentioned um during this director report, Marion and I attended multicultural night up at the seaside high school uh last Wednesday and we we gave out free books and we gave out bookmarks and we talked to kids about uh summer reading and we probably saw over 250 people um and maybe 50 books. It was really quite some fun. We had like top filling right in the front door. Great. And then just this morning, this is part of May, but just this morning I was up um at the high school um presenting and I was interviewed I guess at a civics classroom civics class. They've done this before with one of the other coaches and the kids are working on a unit about um what it means to be a good citizen and they learned about the community resources in town and in communities in general um and about the idea of becoming um knowledgeable about um civics and what's going on. So, we had some really good questions. They asked me, they had

to research me, which made me a little nervous. Google myself. Um, so they found, you know, some articles that had been written here in town about the book challenge and also just some other um programs that were offering um and they came from Colorado. So they found some they found some stuff. They asked really good questions and we were there 8:30 to 9:50. It was long. Yeah. And the first block of the day, those poor kids. One kid slept through the entire and I can just imagine rough times at night, right? and kind of broke for him a little bit. Yeah. You never know what's going on today. But lovely group of kids and I might have convinced between two or four of the young women to get involved with. So um and we had the first Saturday art walk uh this past Saturday. Uh we had seven people so it wasn't zero. So that was good. Um, but it was great to have the art set up in here, be able to welcome folks. And this past month, we the libraries rocked the reading outreach class. Suzanne and I attended the United Way celebration lunch where they sort of say, "Thank you for participating, and here's a, you know, an empty envelope of check because they they just transfer it to her." But it was really great to hear about all of the other programs that are being funded through United Way and I love attending stuff like that because I learned about all the other stuff we could be doing or partnering with. So

that was quite fun. And then we have moved forward with um hiring one of the Classic Works interns for this summer. Um and we have two other candidates that we would like to move forward with budget pending. So um we might try to do smaller smaller amount of hours so that we could do both of I think all three of them a great team. And then here's just a snapshot. So I was able to get the statistics all the way through the end of April. Um, so with our new, we got that new people counter system which is super cool. If I remember how to log in, I just showed you so you can see how neat it is. Um, because you can track it tracks who's coming in and going out because in the past you just see things just count. So I just seems to make sense. Um, so I was able to pull out that, yeah, we had almost 4,000 people. We had almost 4,000 in March. Um, slightly less than that. In April, we made 74 new library cards for folks. And four of those were passport cards. So those are those cards where uh individuals have library cards at participating libraries in Oregon. Come here. They can get a passport card so they can check out limited amount of items for it's good for I think a year. Um see what else? Yep. We added 200 books, 41 DVDs. This is and this is all ages. It's interesting. Almost 4,000 items

circulated in April. 4,000 items were checked out in April and 834 were renewed as in they were at home about every almost every person who walked through no walked through the door checked out something and some people did multiples. That could be or one family like Sarah and then about 60 books. True. And then we have 263 people attending a total of 22 programs. And you know the outreach. So we we consider the multicultural night would be an outreach. Um when Marian does her story times at the preschools, those are outreach events or just like I'll count today's civics class as an outreach event. Um, so he had four of those totaling another 270s. So it's always interesting to put it down on paper and see see the actual Oops. Um, I threw in this professional development. I don't really know what else to call it, but I attended the um LSTA advisory committee meeting. So you may have seen in the news the um the IMLS uh was being um defunded um and disbanded and um LSTA are the local grants statewide grants that are supported by the IMLS. So the LSTA advisory committee for Oregon was meeting to discuss these are just um regular librarians as part of their volunteers and in the library association are get together and review their applications for the grants. So they were moving forward as

if the money was going to still come in and award the award the requests as um as they saw fit. So it was it was an interesting meeting to attend. Um it was also really interesting again to hear what other types of programs and grant opportunities that people are applying for. Maybe some ideas that oh might be something we could do in the future. Um and also what what the individual packets like what the questions were that the committee had about the applications. again just to sort of have a better understanding of what does it look like to have a successful um grant application going forward. So dialing it all away um and at the end of last month I attended Oregon library association conference down in Eugene Eugene. It's a charming little town and actually it's a huge town. It is 110,000 people. Um it was great. I was able to connect with a a fellow trolley driver who relocated to Eugene because they couldn't afford to buy a house here in Story. So, they moved to Eugene, but got to um reconnect with them. But it was it was great to be it was an interesting conference, you know, with with all of the budget cuts and possible um state cuts, state library um reorg happening. is the editor of the YouTube weekly then just like next time. Um so it was it was good to have folks come together and be re-energized even this potential big changes. And then of course Libros for Oregon um I am the

incoming president of the group for the year. Uh this is the group that I went with to Guadalajar for purchasing Spanish books. I believe we have put we have officially said we're not sending a cohort of librarians to Guadalajara this year. Um there were too many unknowns with additional tariffs on bringing books in from another country. um travel in general seemed um seemed like a lot to try to put forward to then find out that there were too many barriers. So, we decided to put it on hold for this year. Um I am still thinking about trying to go myself because it's a overall it's a pretty inexpensive conference to attend. uh through ALA uh you can get your participation paid for and through nice hotel. Uh so there's airfare and then there's even ALA will if you get registered early enough you get another $100 back from ALA. Um, and again, I'm guessing all of this is still in place even because of budget cuts, but I think think still. So, I'm going to see if it's something that I can still do and books, but then figure out how to get them backart my jacket. Um, and then just a few building updates. If you haven't noticed, we um have moved forward with redesigning our multicultural room into the archive. So, right now, nothing's labeled. It's just what we're calling. All of the all of the Spanish books have been moved into

um the main part of the collection by um by the fiction. So, it's where the music CDs used to be. move the music CDs back in the corner where the audio but the archives were and then we're going through the archives because a lot of it is not stuff that we need to keep visible copies of. Um but we did relocate all of the seaside signals into that room. So they're now all on shelves in in order in one place. So, and we're gonna move them around a little bit because they go three shells high and they are big. They're long and they're awkward and I've got so just looking at that I was I don't even know if I can get one down without questioning my feet. So, um we're going to try to move them down lower and make accessible. I've seen them in in libraries where they put lots of shelves together and then they'll just stack like two on each shelf and then two on the next shelf rather than putting them in books and draw a little picture of that. Yeah. So are expensive. The journals are expensive but it worked pretty well to for people have access that way. I like that and then weigh it. Um do um and then one thing I did want to share is that this I learned of this after I wrote out the report um or I finalized the report uh while I was I think it was when I was in the conference um or away at a meeting or something. There was an individual who had been living out of his car and he came in and he needed to use a room for um interviewing. He had a Zoom interview and the boardroom was

taken. We had something going on in here all day. Um so there were they were able to make something happen um where they got him hooked up and you know did his interview. He then got a second interview and he was given the job. I don't know any more details in that, but it was I actually shared that this morning with the civics class with those students. I don't know if they really cared, but um it just is a neat way to show I don't usually see those stories go all the way to the end of how they end. Um you just sort of send them on their way and hope for the best. So, good stuff. Okay. And finished business itself. Um, I don't think we did because we kind of think either anyone else new to this favorite. Um, and you'll notice I did not provide the policy for us to review right now. I just thought it was enough. put it on there and say, "Let's prepare mentally." Do we have a month with mentally prepared? Yes. And it'll be probably like a section by section. It's not going to be word for word. It's going to be it's going to be kind of larger picture than that, I think. Maybe even more like a like our our board retreat that we did and we talk kind of big pictureish and so are

we starting at the top of the policies and working our way through? Um I think I think I haven't I haven't decided how we're going to eat this elephant. It's an elephant. It's it's um I've been through before. It's kind of a Frankenstein elephant. Um things have maybe been plugged in and shoved in. And there are a lot of examples of policies in the world that we could um steal from. There's also chat. This is actually a very good use of both feelings and using each other. Exactly. Because then we go back through and then we can kind of massage it into ador what we need. So um I think just making sure that we have all the big topics covered. You know what are the big buckets that we need to be addressing? Are we missing any right now? I guess maybe a homework assignment. It's gonna be fun. You're gonna love it. Is to review. Um so on our new web page, you'll notice these um Alex added this nice little um roty thing here. So when it first was loaded, it it went very fast. And then when it got to the end, it went all the way back through to the beginning, but not like around like a circle. Oh, I thought it was going to have a stroke. So, we can't we have to fix this. And he miraculously he's just a he's a wiz with

all this tech stuff. So, under here, policies. Wait till you see this exciting page. Whoa. Look, it changes. So, it'll pop open a new window and it's our PDF. So, that's it. 36 pages of excitement. 36 pages. That's not that bad. It took like 10. Yeah. Yeah, there's um I know I think we had talked at some point about the idea of I can create stuff and bring it to you and then you pick it apart and by we create I mean chat GPT um or stealing from other um libraries and just sort of thinking this is basically a placeholder for me. put it on here as a this is on this is my best that's what I I would like to have this updated and I feel like the bulk of the work will be mine and then bring it bringing it to you all to get your perspectives on what should be included okay or outro a lot of it doesn't actually mean too much changing it just gets into certain weeds that we never worked out the last time There's some there's some weeds and ideas weeds and there there's some and by weeds you mean like the mucky muck? Like I feel like there's some there's some little nittygritty. There were things that we I won't say argued about, but we discussed like ad nauseium that I think that we never actually came to settled it. Yeah. Never really settled it. But I would say at least 75% of it other than

it's written in an archaic uh language is probably okay. I read it every now and then just I I do refer to it because you know it is people like oh wait what do we do when this happens? Oh there it is in policy. And that's usually when you discover that you need a bad policy when you go to use it. And the um bad clients or patrons that was a really hard that was a really hard it it was actually the the we part had much more to do about people than No, people are different than books. Yeah. Well, you wanted to be kind and fair and undiscriminate and nondiscriminatory, but but clear. Yeah. People are also less predictable than books. So, you never really know what you're going to need to put in there until it comes up. That's true. Yeah. Didn't someone once say hell is under people? Yes. Many people put that somewhere in subject but just like little nuanced things. Yeah. No, like a lot of it was about nuance and how we were going to be strict but inclusive. So could you go through the policies and say, "Oh, this was a nuance. We need to discuss that again." Yes, there is. and something about what's already been discussed. Yeah, I think for the hard part, so when it comes to policies, I would say having worked in different library systems,

there are policies where every single behavior is listed out, right? And then the one dingdong comes in and they do a behavior listed, you're like, list, so what do we do now? Yeah. But if you have a really short list that's clear and concise, you know, and again open to a little bit of interpretation, but you're not saying these these things are not allowed forget something or you'll be surprised. Um, so I think there's some ways that we can can write it so that staff feel supported, right? Because they're they're turning to the policy often. um and trying to to follow the policy in enforcing rules and I think that actually moving forward with this just brought up to me an interesting point. I I think that um an emphasis on how staff safety you know are going to be the trickiest issues. So maybe as we're working on it, it was a possible way to give some staff input into what would make them feel good and safe about how they people or handle certain situations. And what's interesting, so there's there's policy, right? This is what we hold people accountable to. Um and then there's procedures. So there's um Susan's at the desk right now. Um we are in the process of putting together you know standard operating procedures of uh if if X then Y is this something handle call for backup? What is that backup look like? And so we're we're putting into place some of those those pieces

too. So is this divided into policies and procedures? So we this is just the policy just policy. We will just look at And do you have a a procedure manual? It is in progress. Okay. And that's separate. Those are separate. Yeah. Because our procedures those are internal documents. That's like what we used when we were evaluating those. We have procedures for that. So that's that's for a howto. And those those don't need to be approved by the city council, but our our governing policy our policy that we follow all be approved. Yeah. Did you have a question? Yeah. I was going to ask about what you're wanting to update or change. Is it really just like this part around people for policy? I policy approval. It's it's kind of a policy call and I again I think I mean one thing I could do is I could upload that PDF to check GBT. Yeah. It's miraculous. Yeah. So that I think there's I think there's room for there's room for streamlining, but there's also room for um clarity and and maybe even capturing some things that we haven't captured, but I don't know is it when you use chat GBT, does it come out? because I noticed when I went through the policies that uh to me it sounded like different voices. Yeah. You know, this is one voice over here, but it didn't match. So, does CH GBT kind of summarize it so that it sounds like it's one voice? That's the sense I've got when I dumped things in the voice.

Well, let's let's go with British British. You can like ask it. You can you can upload something that is rewrited and then request like like rewrite this in my own make this sound like me. That sounds like um which is scary kind of a miracle. Uh the last two years we've been working on policy and procedure manuals and uh it can feel incredibly heavy. Yeah. To do the lifting and well it's taken us two years. So to get this and be able to throw it in there. I have not used Jet GPT but I I think that's a great place to start and then do a compare and contrast. Yeah. And I think, you know, having having those big topics, you know, because I don't think we we don't really have a lot on our collection development policy and that there are some libraries that have 36 pages just on collection development, you know, and and that gets almost a little more into the procedure of it all. But I think clear is kind, right? And we have this wonderful staff of folks who are living their lives and may retire or do other things. And so when we have new people in, how do we how do we get them onboarded and up to speed on this is how we do things. So we're trying to capture all those things. Is your policy manual all highlighted and and notes on it? So as you read it, do you make notes of what you I have I have variety of versions of good notes. So yeah, like I said, I put this on here kind of as a homework for me to remember that, hey, I

said we were going to do this as in I'm going to get us started on it. Great. One thing I I probably should have said this was an update. Um, but a couple of things. Um I am out of the country for the next meeting in June. So we can talk about it when we do the next meeting or um what should we talk about? So our options I believe um the meeting would be June 3rd. I first of all I have a question. Is it state mandated that the board absolutely meet every month without fail? No that's anotherction. Yeah. Yes. Um, you already the first the first. So that would be on July. So and then one other piece I wanted to share. Um, Mary had the idea, she got the idea from watching one of the city council meetings that they have student liaison from high school and she said, "Why don't we have a student for the

library?" So, I emailed someone, a counselor up at the school and actually I mentioned it civics class this morning and one of the gals I chatted with um is interested in pursuing that. So, that's great. That would be great. And then we'll have to think about like what does that look like? You know, I'm not sure I think we can probably get more back and forth from a student very yeah 3 to five minutes meeting but no it's great kind of along the lines to building like a team advisor authority that would be great would be the first step I'll let you and I know you tried in the past to kind of connect with the high school library, but Stephie has made that hard. So maybe this could be a little bit of a bridge to high school. Yeah. And and Justin has just finished his second year library has a very gritty feel there and and you know maybe the student get some kind of Yeah. college application. Absolutely. For sure. So that's that's a little mayor. What if they they had a a contest I guess was fourth graders about if I was mayor the city they did these posters that said the things that they would focus on and then the girl who was the little one she got to come up and pay the g and start the city council. It was pretty great. It's it's one of my favorite. Yeah. Okay, that is it for my great um there's no public so I guess comments today. What about comments?

Um I would like to share that uh last month on the first Tuesday of the month. I know this is true cuz I didn't come to the meeting, but the reason I didn't come to the meeting is that I had a terrible, terrible day and I had a total meltdown. And I thought, okay, I'm just going to go to the library and calm down before the meeting. And then because I knew that this is a place that was kind of like a sanctuary and there was a place back in the corner where nobody would see me. And then I saw Jennifer and I completely fell apart again and she said, "Oh, obviously you need Alice time." So she took me in her office to so Alice could smack me around. Um, but what I found so comforting was that before I even saw you, I knew that the library was a place that I could go and be alone and get through whatever it was that I was going through. So, I really value this place. Always have, but even more so now. So, thank you. We should give a special award at some point to Alice some of these pictures. Alice looks like she's in charge. There's a couple pictures where Alice is sitting in your chair at the desk and it's like I think she wants to she is serving Yeah, there are there we have some kerogyny aprons. I won't name any of

them. Uh that just sort of melt inside of the house and they'll stand out there and go in the doorway. So, [Music] um, correct me if I'm wrong, but I think a couple months ago, we learned that there was a federal grant that wasn't coming to the library. Is that right? Um, no, it was a it was through the state, the LSTA grant. We did actually we did receive it. So, um, those grant monies were funded through the year. So our team in turn grant was received. Oh, and that was the one that that there was. Yeah. So there's the federal funding through the IMLS goes out to one of the things they fund are the statewide LST grants, library services, technology. Um so through that system, but there was some concern that that wasn't what it correct. But that's is the answer. Is there is there other money that's your question? Not that I've heard of specifically, not related directly to us, but in terms of of the IMLS money that's going out to the states, it is state libraries are being impacted. Um, so we are all kind of rallying around. That was part of what conference was about is sort of learning about all the things that the state does for us. we sort of take it for granted. You know, the state library, they offer professional resources. They have um consulting and adisement and committees and various other support. So, um that will go

away potentially because they're about 25% of their staff cut. Um are things like DEI or is anything like that starting to filter because I think in some states it already is. I haven't heard that. I mean, Oregon is in pretty good position right now, but you know, think it's shifting since, but I do know that one of the things that the state library um subsidizes is the courier system for for remote libraries. So there are remote libraries across the state that their collections would maybe fit in this room and they are relying heavily on that if a library loan courier service. So that will be challenged. There's also I think they um offset the cost of um electronic resources too. So could be budgetary computers uh like access to electronic databases and access to balance. Can I ask the question is talking book and braille services with this as well? Um I believe I believe so just because it's I don't know if it's part of a general fund or if it's funed through LSTA serve a lot of people. Yes. I asked because there's a lot of talk about strategic plan and the politics and I don't know how we can plan anything this administr because every day it's something different. Every day this is

getting slashed and that's getting slashed and oh no I didn't really mean that then we're going to you know this whole job it's gone. The whole combining is just swap because it's a green energy. Yeah. I guess all I can say is we'll just keep plugging forward and when when the money gets taken away. I think we're and better shape than some communities who are pretty resilient to them. some of the things that came up even with city council listened in feel but it's going to be a challenge but the city also could get to the point where they start going you know what's our priorities and where are we going to put the money and that's why we voices say the library is important because you don't want it to all be police cars and fire trucks It's got to be good stuff. Yeah. But but if people aren't speaking up for that. No, what Matthew was saying like the library is such a huge community resource not just for books or computers or educational purposes but just as a safe space and I think in a community like where so many people are need space from day to day it's very important actually said you know it's not just about trucks and police cars but honestly this is this is somewhat of a sanctuary for a lot of people. Yeah. I I just feel 3,64.

Exactly. I just feel like so so many departments get rubber stamped whatever this Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. other departments. Wait a minute though. Wait a minute. This is important too. So, well, I did reiterate. I didn't talk about set with civics but I did reiterate the idea of you know some one of the kids asked something about you know how is the library changed in the years that you've been lied there um I said but we've you know we continue to evolve and we're so much more about it being a place to be and a community center and hub and the refuge of course um I said people will stop as they're driving through and they'll just use our internet print something off and you know maybe fill up the water bottle and have a quick sit the newspaper and so in in light in light of the new administration and their focus on harassing anybody who has a darker complexion do are you noticing a drop in in visits from Latino families or to your kids. No, that's something I've been worried about since the election. You know, somebody posted yesterday that ICE was in Canon Beach. Now, I never saw any other confirmation of that, but we're not I mean, there's been a couple of time will be up on the list. People were um captured by a live Yeah. Did people come into town with ice on their back? Is that No, unfortunately they don't come in with ice on the bed. That's why I'm wondering who's, you know, but but when they start driving people off the street, it's pretty easy to determine that they're

somebody can beach up on trucks. Okay. Not always, but but they have a lot of unmarked vehicles, too. And they have unmarked uniforms and and they even have these vigilante guys who are portraying themselves as eyes, and they're not. They're just vigilant. That's the scariest. Yeah. Yeah. So, I just don't want any of our they self enforce. Yeah. The policy here for the library staff, we've talked about this because libraries all um that if I mean there's there's your basic library privacy uh that we have. So, if an officer, you know, one of my colleagues comes in and says, "Is so and so here?" I can't say that they are like that's that's violation of patron patron privacy. So regardless of who comes in and asks or you know is who's working here or do you know these people um the staff are directed to to candy me or Josh so that we will will navigate that conversation with them and not to you know give out any information. Yeah. Good. Yeah, it's just something to be aware of. Just being prepared is better. Any other board comment? All right, our next meeting will be July 1st, 4 p.m. and I will review the policy. It's on my classes. [Music]