Fox Valley Library Council
Executive Board Meeting
July 9, 2003

Present: Rick Krumwiede, Pete Gilbert, Erin Czech, Rhonda Butt, Terra Mobley, Joy Schwarz, and Mark Arend.

1. Call to order
   Rick called the meeting to order at 9:36 am.

   Because Elizabeth Timmins was unable to attend this meeting, Joy volunteered to take minutes. New Director-at-large Terra introduced herself, and other board members did likewise.

2. Minutes of April 16, 2003 Board Meeting
   Pete motioned approval of the April 16, 2003 Board minutes. Erin Czech seconded, and the motion carried.

3. Additions to the Agenda
   Joy requested adding as Old Business an update on reimbursement forms on the FVLC web site.

4. Treasurer's Report
   Pete said that since the bank has not sent a June bank statement yet, and since there has been little financial activity in FVLC since his last report, he did not prepare a treasurer's report for this meeting.

5. Correspondence
   Rick shared an e-mail message he received from Steve Proces. The topic of Steve's message regarded libraries going into co-sponsorship with businesses, and the commercialization of library activities. Steve asked if FVLC is interested in this as a program topic at a meeting, as a discussion, or if FVLC would develop a stance regarding it. After discussion, Rick passed the topic Mark's way, and Mark will pass it along to the Education Committee. Rick will reply to the e-mail with a suggestion that Steve post a message to the FVLC-L discussion list.

6. Review of 2002-2003 Programs
   Mark distributed a report of the Education Committee, and gave his summary of the report:
   • The Education Committee tried to get a good variety of topics, locations and times to make it easier for people to attend.
   • Two Education Committee members (Janice Dibble and Beth Carpenter) are leaving the committee, and Mark asked the Board to give him suggestions for new recruits.

   The Board gave Mark feedback about the past year's programs. The Board suggested that the Education Committee schedule one program for late September or early October, and schedule the annual meeting in May. The Education Committee will decide whether to schedule 2 or 4 meetings next year.

   At this point Mark excused himself from the meeting.

7. 2003-2004 Meeting Schedule
   It was decided that the Education Committee should set the schedule of General meetings, due to the varied needs of guest speakers.

   The next FVLC Board meeting was set for Wednesday September 3, 2003, 9:30 am at the Oshkosh Public Library. Rick stated that the rest of the FVLC Board meeting schedule could be determined after the Education Committee has set dates for the General meetings.

8. Executive Board Organization
   
   1. Committee Chairs
      Rick appointed Mark Arend chair of the FVLC Education Committee chair, and appointed Erin Czech chair of the FVLC Resource Sharing Committee. Pete motioned approval of the appointments. Rhonda seconded, and the motion carried unanimously and enthusiastically.
   2. Directors at Large
      The area of concentration of each Director at Large was determined by consensus of the board:
      • By-laws -- Erin
      • Intellectual freedom -- Rhonda and Terra
      • Solicit new members -- Rhonda and Terra
      • Publicize the Council -- Terra

   This year Rick wants to make it a priority to clean up the FVLC mailing list, so he'll work on this project with Terri Richards.

9. Proposed 2003-2004 Plan
   The Board discussed the Plan, and the following changes were recommended:
   • In item D. 2. the phrase, "Survey member libraries periodically..." was determined no longer relevant in a one-year plan.
   • Terra proposed that we offer a form on the FVLC web site where members could report intellectual freedom issues or ask for help. The FVLC Board would see output from the form. The Board agreed that this should be done.
   • Pete made a motion that the a new item be added to the FVLC Handbook as a Fall Board Meeting scheduled activity of the Directors at Large: "Review the need for any surveys (censorship, programming, resource sharing) to be conducted to gather information in support of the Councils current year activities." Erin seconded, and the motion carried.

   Pete moved approval of the proposed plan as amended, Erin seconded, motion carried, and the 2003-2004 FVLC Plan was adopted.

10. Evaluation of Organizational Changes
    It's too soon to survey the membership now, but It was decided that we should start drafting a survey now, so it can go out to members by the middle of our fiscal year, in time for discussion. Further discussion of this issue was tabled until the next board meeting,

11. Discussion of Budget Surplus
    
    • Rick would like the FVLC Board to develop a policy for giving a gift to outgoing president officers. This item will be added to the agenda for the next Board meeting.
    • Ideas for how to spend the budget surplus:
      • Creation of an online, searchable, interactive membership database -- Rick and Pete will draft an RFP for the next Board meeting.
      • Continuing Education Grants -- A possible increase in the amount was discussed. Rick stated that we should promote our grants, and if the money gets used up we can increase it.

12. Old Business
    Web forms -- Joy will continue work on drafts of the reimbursement forms to make them useful to users and the FVLC Treasurer.

13. Adjournment
    Rick adjourned the meeting at 12:13 pm.

Joy Schwarz, secretary du jour