DeForest Area Public Library Regular Library Board Minutes
Thursday, March 3, 2022 at 6:00 p.m.
- Call to Order and Roll Call
- The meeting was called to order at 6 p.m.by Vice President John Englesby
- Present: Englesby, Gorres, Landgraf, Lawrence, Runez, and Zeimet
- Absent: Van Iten (Runez left at 6:40)
- Also present: Library Director Berg
- Approval of Agenda
- Motion to approve as presented: Landgraf
- Second: Zeimet
- Discussion: None.
- Action: All approved.
- Approval of Minutes of the February 3rd Meeting
- Motion to approve the minutes: Zeimet
- Second: Landgraf and amended year on Ethics to 1993
- Discussion: None
- Action: All approved as amended.
- Public Presentations / Communications
- None.
- Approval of Bills – Berg had emailed out the bill run prior to the meeting
- Motion to Approve the Bills: Zeimet
- Second: Landgraf
- Discussion: Berg pointed out that aside from the usual utility bills and bills for books and audio visual materials that there is a bill for an AED. Tony from the Fire Dept. recommended the model purchased. It is what is used in other village departments. He was happy that we have one now. Although its cabinet has yet to be installed and the actual box with the device has yet to be opened. There are also a number of bills from Ace for paint. Public Works guys painted the story hour room and its bathroom. We supplied the paint, brushes, and rollers. They did a great job.
- Action: All Approved
- Reports
- Director's - Berg noted one employee’s mother passed away a week ago Monday. Another employee’s mother is in hospice. A third employee’s mother is in the hospital and needs caretaking by her. Hoopla use is fairly stable at about 150 items for the first two months of use. Audio books are the most used. We will be able to provide wireless printing (you can send a document from your phone, tablet, or laptop to our printer and get it printed out). We will also be offering scanning and faxing to the public as well. It’s very exciting to be able to offer this service to our patrons and keep step with our neighboring libraries to the east and west of us.
- President's - Kathy Van Iten is in Nashville on a buying trip. She said she would think of us while the meeting was going on. Englesby noted how wonderful it was that the library and DeForest Area Historical Society worked together. He mentioned that two former library employees, Louise Valdovinos and Jane Henze were now very involved in the Historical Society and have done so much.
- Village Update - Landgraf noted that the Village Board met the previous Tuesday. TIFs were talked about at the Committee of the Whole meeting to help the new administrator understand where the village is at with them. It was as 20 minute board meeting Preliminary approval for Home Town baseball. More housing units across from Door Creek Church. Mountain Bike trail has been referred to an ad hoc committee after their 2nd meeting they should be making recommendations to the Village Board.
- Old Business
- Continued discussion about the strategic plan.
- Berg was happy to report that library staff finished up the review of the entire plan at the March 1st meeting. During the process a couple of the goals were consolidated and some of the action items underneath the goals were removed or combined. One item that did not come up except in two questions was increasing the size of the building. 12.4 % thought there should be more meetings rooms. When asked what we should do if a big bag of money landed on the library 13.5% thought we should add more space and do some improvements – it is a 20 year old building after all. The next draft of the plan should be ready for the April library board meeting.
- Continued discussion about the strategic plan.
- New Business
- Discussion of the Annual Report Data
- Berg had sent out a side-by-side spreadsheet showing previous year’s numbers. The numbers that really Need to be looked at are in red. There are only two in red. One is magazine subscriptions which are just difficult to find and are being replaced to some extent by digital magazines. The other is our kit line that includes toys, rubber stamp kits, software, etc. Some of those items, such as the old software – some still on floppies—have finally been weeded. The overall numbers aren’t that large. A decrease of only 223 items between 2020 and 2021. A lot of green is good.
- Discussion of the Annual Report Data
- Future Agenda Items
- Develop and approve Long Range Plan
- Adjournment
- Motion to Adjourn: Zeimet
- Second: Landgraf
- Action: All approved.
Meeting was adjourned at 6:51. Next meeting April 7th, 2022.