Government Publications Librarians of New England
Minutes of the December 6, 2002 Meeting at
Harvard University, Lamont Library, Cambridge, MA.


Betty Febo began the meeting with an introduction of Donna Koepp, the Head of Government Documents/Microforms and Head of Reference and Instruction for the Social Sciences Program at Lamont Library, Harvard University.

Guest Speakers

Donna Koepp gave a talk and demonstration regarding her work with the U.S. Serial Set, the map inventory project and the Serial Set database. She discussed her working experiences with the numerous maps found in the Serial Set over the course of her career, from her time at the Denver Public Library to today at Harvard University

While at a workshop in the 1970s Donna learned there were numerous maps within the U.S. Serial Set. While going through the Serial Set she noticed there was no index to the maps within the Serial Set Index. Upon learning the State Library of Colorado was removing their Serial Set volumes, Donna took the set and removed and preserved the maps. This eventually resulted in the creation of the CIS Serial Set Map Index.
Donna began seeking grants to begin indexing each map while at the University of Kansas.

Donna went into great detail the steps needed to complete the process from writing grants to hiring researchers, indexers, and database managers. She also touched on the problems that developed, one being getting access to missing volumes. With a project of this size, Donna needed to make sure all the volumes within the Serial Set were accounted for. She made numerous trips to the Senate Library in Washington, D.C. In the end the number of maps indexed total 54,000. Donna mentioned that CIS assisted in completing the project. There were 120 maps that did not make it in to Maps Index.

Next Donna spoke about the online index that has been created to alert librarians across the country as to which library holds certain volumes of the Serial Set. She demonstrated the online database, which is still under construction, and has not been released to the public as of yet. The U.S. Senate Library has inventoried from the 15th Congress to the 91st Congress, and is the only library that has volumes in the database. Donna also mentioned that five libraries though out the country have inventoried their collection for the database.  Once the website is completed other institutions holding Serial Set volumes will be able to place their holdings online using the template provided.

Though the creation of this site will be extremely useful there was a brief discussion regarding the hesitancy of undertaking a project such as this one. The major problem that was discussed was opening up to the public a library’s holding of rare Serial Set volumes.




Betty Febo introduced Karen Valley, who is the current President of the New England Library Association (NELA). Karen is also the Head of Branch Services at Portland Public Library in Portland, Maine.

Karen gave a brief discussion of  NELA and how they association operates. Karen provided handouts:
    New England Library Association Policy and Procedures Manual
        VII. Special Interest Groups: Overview
    Mission of the New England Library Association
(these hand outs will be scanned and posted to the GPLNE listserv before the March  meeting)

Karen mentioned the steps needed for a new interest group must undertake to become a member of NELA.
    A letter must be sent to the President of NELA asking to be considered for registration as a special interest group.
    Each member of the interest group or the institution that member represents, must become a member of NELA paying specific membership dues according to one’s salary.
    The chairperson of the interest group must sit on the Executive Board and attend the six meetings as well as the Annual Meeting of NELA.
    After three years this Special Interest Group would then become a Section of NELA.

Karen also talked about the benefits of becoming a Special Interest Group within NELA whereby this group would receive money for displays at the Annual Conference. It was also mentioned that NELA would be willing to lobby to the U.S. Congress for our group with regard the future of the Government Printing Office.


News from the GPO Annual Conference in Washington D.C.

There is currently a report on the GPO conference meeting from October 2002 in the minutes of the November GoDIG meeting at UMass Medical.

Bette provided handouts from the GPO meeting for those that were interested.
There was a brief discussion of the developing situation with GPO and OMB. Sen. Mark Dayton spoke at the October meeting and was sympathetic to Documents Librarians’ needs

The Self-Study process is currently undergoing an audit. It was also mentioned that within the Washington, D.C. area. There could be unannounced visits regarding visitor entrance to a library.

GPO is going to create an Integrated Library System (ILS), which will improve the services to libraries and make a greater range of publication available to the public, from 1976 to the present.  See Administrative Notes from November 15, 2002.

There was a brief mention of the new password for depository libraries for the USA Trade online. This also can be found in the Administrative Notes from November 15, 2002

Business Meeting

September minutes will be amended to correct the dates for the next two scheduled meetings in 2003. The March meeting will be on Friday the 7th and the May meeting with be on Friday the 9th.

Treasurer’s Report

Treasurer Pam Hayes announced that GPLNE’s CD for $1000 comes due on January 8, 2003.  We currently have $402.44 in our Savings account. The group voted to remove the interest of $100 from the CD and place that amount in to Savings. With interest rates rather low in was decided to extend the CD for an 18 months to receive 1.5%.

Other news from the Floor.

For Massachusetts Libraries, there are questions regarding the future of Massachusetts State Tax forms. As of December 6th the forms had not been proofed. Bette Siegel, of the State Library of Massachusetts reported that the State Tax forms were no longer going to be distributed to U.S. Post Offices in Massachusetts. Bette is having the Director of the State Library contact the Commission of Revenue requesting the Libraries in the Massachusetts area receive these tax forms. Bette will share any information as it becomes available.  Gail Fithian, of the Boston Public Library will also be contacting the appropriate people to resolve this issue.

Bette Febo, of Wellesley College announced that the Government Documents area of the College Library would be under going renovations. Two-thirds to ¾ of the collection will be boxed up from January 3 to though March.

Betty Febo mentioned that she wants input to the officers regarding their thoughts on NELA or different groups that members feel may be appropriate.

Jim MacDonald of Connecticut College will host the next meeting March 7th.


Meeting Adjurned



Attendees:

Lise Albury        Norwich University
Betty Febo        Wellesley College
Gail Fithian        Boston Public Library
Pam Hays        Harvard University
Delana Hirchy        Harvard University
Linda Johnson        University of New Hampshire
Bob Kehner        MIT
Donna Koepp        Harvard University
Jim MacDonald    Connecticut College
Tim Slaughter        Harvard University
Connie            Tufts University
Mark Scott        State Library of Massachusetts
Bette Siegel        State Library of Massachusetts
Ralph Szymczak    Brandeis University
Jim Walsh        LexisNexis