LAUC-B Executive Committee Minutes 08/27/2014

LAUC-B Executive Committee

August 27, 2014

10 am – 12 pm

Room 225 Doe Library

Members present: Rita Evans (chair), Lynn Jones, Kendra Levine, Lisa Ngo, Jesse Silva, Liladhar Pendse, Elliott Smith (recorder), I-Wei Wang

I. Announcements

  • Distinguished Librarian Award: December 3, 3:00 - 5:00 pm, Morrison Room; recipients to be announced.
  • LAUC-B Social Hour: Friday, August 29, 4:00 - 6:00 pm, Faculty Club

II. Reports

A. Treasurer's Report (L. Ngo)

  • Current account balance: $65,518

B. Meeting with the University Librarian of August 2014 (R. Evans, I. Wang)

  • New UL - Phyllis Hoffman in the Provost’s office will coordinate the search process. We can assume the search committee will be broad-based and likely to have a librarian; a search firm may be involved. No indication whether the campus Administration is looking for a professional librarian or a faculty member; there are advantages and disadvantages to both. We have a copy of the job description from Tom’s hiring in 2000 and he suggested we look at UCLA’s current UL job description.
  • Affinity Group Heads hiring - Admin has sent response to AFT’s cease and desist letter.
  • Professional development funding – Tom reiterated that the Library will cover funding for this year and librarians should proceed with commitments for travel, etc. LAUC is being asked to “demonstrate initiative” in addressing this funding issue long-term.
  • Allusers listserv - This goes to not just current librarians but some retirees, vendors, etc. so the Library has created a new LIB listserv which includes everyone who ultimately reports to the UL. It does NOT include Affiliateds, so Rita will contact Erik Mitchell and suggest including the Affil list if messages should go to all campus librarians/staff.
  • Berkeley Procedures revision - We confirmed that the task force is working on this (James Eason will send draft to ExComm at end of August).

C. LAUC Statewide Transition Meeting of August 11, 2012 (I. Wang)

  • Nick Robinson, LAUC Statewide President 2013-14, gave an end-of-term summary.
  • Matt Conner, LAUC Statewide President 2014-15, introduced new business:
    • Organization: Examination of whether a cross-functional organizational model (matrix management) might be applicable to LAUC Statewide.
    • New projects:
      • LAUC Position papers review: Papers are to be reviewed and updated
      • Bylaws review: Campus LAUC chapters should review bylaws to determine whether they reflect appropriate membership criteria
      • Academic Personnel Manual (APM): A revision is coming soon. A first round of feedback submitted by one LAUC member from each campus will be followed by a 60-day comment period for the LAUC membership at large.



        ACTION ITEM: Rita Evans will contact potential nominees to provide the first round of feedback for the APM revision.

III. Continuing Business

A. Presentations on LAUC-sponsored research and professional development

  • A discussion was held about whether the LAUC-B Research Committee should be charged with organizing a regular event for presentations by funding recipients on their current research.



    ACTION ITEM: Rita Evans will create a task force to review the Research Committee charge.

B. LAUC Standing Committee nominations (R. Evans)

  • A call was issued by the Nominations and Elections Committee for nominations to the LAUC Statewide Committee on Professional Governance and the LAUC Statewide Committee on Research and Professional Development.



    ACTION ITEM: Rita Evans will appoint nominated candidates for the LAUC Statewide Committee on Professional Governance and the LAUC Statewide Committee on Research and Professional Development.

IV. New Business

A. Administrative:

  • LAUC-B ExComm mailing list: Updates to the LAUC-B ExComm mailing list were confirmed.
  • Minutes review: Procedures for sharing and review of the draft LAUC-B ExComm minutes were discussed. There will be a one week period for review of the draft minutes.
  • bSpace site: The LAUC-B ExComm bSpace site will be retired after Spring 2015.



    ACTION ITEM: Elliott Smith will investigate the steps necessary to migrate the LAUC-B ExComm and other committee bSpace sites to bCourses by the end of Spring 2015. He will determine whether it’s possible to create one site with different permissions for access to sub-sites, or whether multiple sites will have to be created.
  • LAUC-B website updates: The pages for ExComm, the Affiliated Libraries Committee, the Conference Planning Committee, and the Professional Development Committee have been updated by the Secretary. The pages for other committees will be updated as information on new membership is received.

B. Request for Comment: “DRAFT: Concept Proposal for a New Structure for UC Collection Librarian Groups” from Strategic Action Group 3: Collection Building & Management (SAG 3)

  • UC Bib Group meeting Thursday, August 28, 9 am will elicit responses to the request for comments on the SAG3 draft proposal; individual comments can also be sent to Beth Dupuis.



    ACTION ITEM: Kendra Levine will send a message to affiliated librarians to be sure they have the opportunity to respond.

C. Professional development funding

The Provost's office has traditionally funded LAUC-B's budget for operating expenses, certain professional activities (including the biannual LAUC-B Conference, the Distinguished Librarian Award, and candidate and mentor lunches), and the professional development funding guaranteed by the Memorandum of Understanding as well as supplemental professional development funding. The Provost's office has announced that after the 2014-2015 year, it will no longer provide funding to LAUC-B except for the MOU-mandated funds.

For this current fiscal year, 2014-15, the Provost's office and Library administration together will cover the full LAUC-B budget request from the following funding sources:

  • Provost will provide $31,000 (compared to about $90,000 historically).
  • LAUC-B will use approximately $37,000 in its balance of unspent funds from previous fiscal years
  • The Library will cover the shortfall (approximately $30,000)

In the future, the University Librarian will continue to provide the MOU-guaranteed amount for professional development, but has not thus far committed to supplementing this budget. The University Librarian suggested that LAUC-B develop other funding sources to continue its other activities, and/or to supplement the professional development funds available to individual librarians.

Different strategies for requesting that this decision be revisited were discussed, as were other potential funding sources. It was noted that the Commission Report specifically mentioned the importance of continuing professional development among librarians, and that perhaps the Faculty Senate Library Committee would support LAUC-B's efforts to seek new funding.

D. The University Library’s Year in Review

Tom Leonard’s report on the University Library’s Year in Review, presented at the Early Bird on August 19, was discussed. Two issues were identified for future discussion by ExComm:

  • NRLF: space, policies, and access/discoverability
  • Berkeley Research Impact Initiative (BRII): funding

E. Topics for discussion at the September 10 ExComm meeting:

  • Diversity Charge Task Force, Internships webpage (report submitted to ExComm)
  • CAPA Task Force to revise Berkeley Procedures (draft report due to ExComm at the end of August)
  • Role of LAUC in communications from/about union