Library Board Approved Minutes - December 2, 2021

DeForest Area Public Library Regular Library Board Minutes
Thursday, December 2, 2021 at 6:00 p.m.

  1. Call to Order and Roll Call
    • The meeting was called to order at 6:02 p.m.by President Van Iten
    • Present: Englesby, Gorres, Landgraf, Lawrence, Runez, and Van Iten.
    • Absent: Zeimet
    • Also present: Library Director Berg
  2. Approval of Agenda
    • Motion to approve as presented: Englesby
    • Second: Gorres
    • Discussion: None.
    • Action: All approved.
  3. Approval of Minutes of the November 4th, 2021 Meeting
    • Motion to approve the minutes: Runez
    • Second: Landgraf
    • Discussion: None
    • Action: All approved.
  4. Public Presentations / Communications
    • Berg shared a flyer titled “Celebrate the Season” that listed all the activities at the library during the month of December.
  5. Approval of Bills – Berg had emailed out the bill run prior to the meeting
    • Motion to Approve the Bills: Englesby
    • Second: Runez
    • Discussion: Berg noted this is a large bill run. It has all of the utility bills due to two last minute arrivals today. It is mostly books. We have started Hoopla as a service to the community. Hoopla is a streaming service that has six formats – Audio books. Electronic books, comics, magazines, music, and video. It is pay per use. Over a million titles are available without waiting. Berg noted that this is complements Overdrive and Kanopy nicely. Interstate Books 4 Schools has one to two million books available. The average cost of the 407 books purchased was $2.50. The computers are part of the annual replacement cycle. There were no questions about the bill run.
    • Action: All Approved
  6. Reports
    1. Director's - Dino Days was a huge success. The animatronic dinosaurs were huge hits. Berg was the gatekeeper at the story hour room door. Families went in to meet the dinosaur, get pictures taken, and leave. Some children were not happy about meeting Delilah. Their reluctance was reminiscent of visits to Santa where mom and dad are all excited and the child is screaming “no”. The keypad on the library’s electronic locker is wearing out. Berg has been trying to track down a replacement. Some lights that were recently replaced are blinking or not lit any longer. Motion sensor also don’t seem to be working as they should. Nickles Electric will come in and do replacements using a small lift that doesn’t require that the mullions be removed. All the libraries in south central Wisconsin were without internet on Monday, November 22nd. A backhoe between Lake Geneva and Kenosha cut the line.
    2. President's - None.
    3. Village Update - There was a discussion about a mountain bike park and where to put it that had those for and those against attending the village board meeting. This would give children ages 10-18 something to do. Children were watching. Some of the adults didn’t model the best behavior. Landgraf attended the Christmas tree lighting and Santa’s arrival on the firetruck. Hot chocolate and cookies were provided and about 400 attended. The candle light walk in Western Green for Winterfest is coming up. The village board will interview the top five candidates for village administrator and hope to have someone picked by the end of Saturday, December 11th.
  7. Old Business
    1. Continued discussion about the strategic plan.
      • Due to holidays and staff vacations Berg had been unable to get staff together to discuss the draft of the long range plan. As soon as staff can get together to give input, Berg will update the draft and bring it to the library board.
    2. On-going discussion of draft FY2022 Budget
      • Berg emailed a copy of budget cuts proposed by Jim Simpson. Discussion followed around the cuts. Landgraf said there was no need for the library board to do a formal response. He supported the library budget and would do so with the proposed cuts. Berg said she would attend the meeting as well.
  8. New Business
    1. None.
  9. Future Agenda Items
    1. Develop and approve Long Range Plan
    2. 2022 Budget
  10. Adjournment
    • Motion to Adjourn: Runez
    • Second: Landgraf
    • Action: All approved.

Meeting was adjourned at 7 p.m. Next meeting January 6th, 2022.

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