Sage Council Meeting Minutes
July 20, 2021
Attendees: Perry Stokes (Vice-chair), Mark Rose (out-going chair), Dea Nowell, Laurie O’Connor, Maggie Pando, Ann Zuehlke, Ryan McGinnis, Jon Georg (Sage), Beth Ross (Sage), Rachael Fox, Delia Fields, Brittany Young, Mary Reser
Approval of May 2021 minutes – Dea moved to approve minutes, Ryan seconded and all attendees were in favor.
Committee Reports
Cataloging Committee – The committee met last on June 7th. The topics covered were the validation aids available in Marc Edit and a change to the parts document for when there were multiple seasons. Catalogers were reminded to try multiple search methods to locate a matching title before adding so that duplicates could be avoided. Catalogers were also reminded that children’s subjects are a separate thesaurus and that they are not always the same as adult subject headings. A look up in the Library of Congress authority database is necessary. The audience field was discussed and that “e” should only be used when it is exclusively adult and there is a notation similar to “suggested for mature readers”.
Update on open council positions – There are currently 5 open positions, including the academic seat vacated due to Marsha Richmond’s retirement. Beth sent out a message to the listserv asking for volunteers. She received a nomination for Maggie Pando to fill the position for Public Libraries over 15,000, which was accepted. Beth also spoke with Ann, who is willing to serve again. We still need to get another circulating schools member but hopefully once school starts that recruitment will be more successful. Other positions needed are at the academic/community college, public libraries 5,000 to 15,000, and public libraries under 5,000 levels.
Beth asked what steps she should take next. Mark volunteered to help with contacting community college libraries. Brittany (BMCC) is willing to serve on Sage council if we can help reduce their courier responsibility. Beth will meet with her to see what can be worked out.
Volunteers were requested for officer positions. Ryan volunteered to chair. Perry suggested that Ryan could serve as an interim chair until such time that the council seats were filled and an electronic vote could take place. Dea nominated Ryan as interim chair, Ann seconded the motion. All voted in favor.
Delia and Ann volunteered to contact schools about open positions.
Server replacement update (Jon) – all virtual machines have been built and the two database servers are online. We’ve already done the preliminary replication and the new network is ready. The new system isn’t going to have some of the issues that we’ve had in the past. Many redundancies are being added, along with an increase in system notifications for when services go down. The recent issue with auto-renewals not occurring when the log server went down is being fixed, with patron records getting adjusted to match what should have happened. The new network is sand-boxed and on its own subnet with any traffic having to go through a firewall. Services such as SIP and Z39.50 will be on their own virtual servers. We will also be adding additional application servers to handle more traffic. A notice will be sent out when we know what day the server upgrade will take place.
Evergreen upgrade update (Beth) – We are waiting to hear from Equinox on a date.
Circ policy/Notices – During the Covid pandemic adjustments were made to accommodate new procedures and provide more access. One of the adjustments was to remove the $5 fine limit. Some libraries since then have wanted to set a higher limit. Are we ready to turn back on the $5 limit for Sage in general? Also, some notice texts were changed. Do we want to adjust those back?
Another topic for discussion, particularly for those libraries whom have gone fine-free, is that of a different limit. There is now the ability to set a limit on the number of overdue items. This creates an incentive to return items.
Perry – is the $5 limit set in the circulation policy? Dea checked, and yes it is there. Dea moved that we re-instate until such time that another limit is approved. Perry seconded the motion. All voted to approve. Perry indicated that discussion of an increased limit should take place within the circulation committee.
Beth volunteered to go through the notices and find any special text that was added during the pandemic and remove if desired. Perry asked if those scripts were available for viewing somewhere on the system. Beth indicated that they weren’t generally viewable but that she could put them together in a spreadsheet and send out. Both Sage and library specific notice texts will be represented.
Annual statistics – a reminder that Beth will be doing the annual statistics again this year and providing those to the State Library. Her goal is to have them done at the end of July. Ryan is willing to help libraries get their overdrive statistics and send out an instructional video. Dea asked that the collection numbers for Overdrive be sent out as well.
Additional – Perry posted a link to the Sage financial folder. It has the documents for the end of the fiscal year plus the start of the new fiscal year.
The next Sage Council meeting will be held September 21, 2021. Mark moved that we adjourn. The meeting ended at 10:51 am Pacific time.