The Town of Lincoln, MA - Library Trustees

Spending is at expected levels for most categories. Book binding is at 126%, but this is a one-time expense each year for re-binding books and binding periodicals. Some periodicals such as the Lincoln Journal newspaper – which is fragile – are microfilmed (Barbara subsequently reported that the cost for microfilming the Journal is $275 per year).

The Library accepted a quilt from the Girl Scouts which prompted a discussion of whether all such gifts should be subject to board approval. A motion was put forward that “All gifts that will be permanently displayed in the library should be subject to board approval”. The motion did not pass.

We have a bid from several interior designers to review, the slate for the roofing project had been delivered to the library, and we are looking at initiating an engineering review of the window condition in preparation for the Gund building window replacement project.

The Gund windows and fire suppression projects have been forwarded by the capital planning committee to the CPA. Peter has been making the case to Pat Phillips and others that the window project should be done all at once and not piece-meal. This approach and the necessity of replacing the windows seems to have been accepted by the CPC and triggered little discussion. The Pierce House cut back their requests and this has eased the budget strain. We need to position our request relative to the Ridge property, and to do this we need to get a better estimate of the project cost. To better estimate the cost the engineering study of the window conditions will be helpful.

On December 23 the Lincoln Brownies donated a quilt they had made to the Library. The troop had read a book called, The Quiltmaker’s Gift. In this story a quilt maker gives her quilts away to people in need. The Lincoln Brownies asked if the library could use the quilt they made. I thought it would be a great addition to the DeNormandie Room and could picture someone curled up with the quilt in one of the big leather chairs, reading a book. The Lincoln Brownies liked this idea too so we left the quilt in the DeNormandie Room ready for anyone who wants to use it. Patrons may take the quilt to their favorite places in the library and enjoy it while they are at the library.

The library’s capital plan requests for FY 2007 include (1) new carpets for the Children’s Room and Staff Workroom, (2) an engineering study to extend the sprinkler system, and (3) replacement windows for the defective windows now installed in the Gund Building. On November 29 Peter Sugar and I presented our requests to the Capital Planning Committee. The Capital Planning Committee had the same reaction to our request to replace the defective windows as they had to our request last year to replace the defective roof on the Gund Building. Jack Pugh came to the December 6 meeting where we gave more history about how the problem was discovered and repair work that was performed in the past.

The replacement carpets are included in the Town’s FY 2007 capital plan. The requests for an engineering study for expanding the sprinkler system and replacement windows were referred to the Community Preservation Committee, which will meet in January.

The First Joint Budget Workshop was held on December 7. In attendance were Selectmen, the Finance Committee, governing boards, and Department Heads. Each department presented two budgets: a base budget and a preferred budget. The Finance Committee’s guideline for the base budget was a 2% increase over the FY 2006 budget. For the preferred budget, there was no restriction but we would need to defend our preferred budget at this budget workshop.

Some of the other Town departments asked for very large increases for their preferred budgets in order to provide new services. Altogether the increases totaled approximately one million dollars. The library’s preferred budget request was an increase of $29,000 and includes: (1) keeping the library open on Sundays, (2) more staff hours to cover the reference desk on Wednesday afternoons and (3) more administrative staff time to work on building projects.

On December 7 H.H. Fuller, an author who has written two mysteries set in the local area featuring Bert Lane – cameraman, came to the library and read a few scenes from It’s a Wrap and Film at 11.

The Friday Morning Book Group discussed How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents, by Julia Alvarez. The December 16^th meeting was cancelled due to inclement weather. Ellen will have a double-header book group on January 6 to make up for the missed book group meeting. The Mystery Mondays Book Group took December off and will meet again on January 23.

Leslie Miller exhibited her paintings in the gallery and Theresa Deible displayed pottery in the glass case. Barry Paul and Paul Svetz installed an animated winter scene in the Reference Room in mid-November. This year’s display is larger than the display Messrs Paul and Svetz installed last year. Many patrons, especially children, have enjoyed this exhibit.

The weekly fall programs continued in December until the Lincoln School students began their vacations. Dana Weigent created the winter crafts for the children to make during the week of December 19. She had several crafts for the children so they could come to the library each day and make something new. For vacation week, the Children’s Department scheduled Robert Rivest, a mime and comedian, to perform his most humorous and heart warming mime stories on December 28.

Lisa Rothenberg, our Head of Technical Services, had two upgrades to install on the library’s computers. One was an upgrade to the computers used by staff with the new version of the Millennium software that has modules for circulation and cataloging. The new version of the Millennium software makes a small improvement to the circulation module’s request functions. There is a poorly designed feature in the current version that can cause a patron’s request for a book to get stuck. Library staff needs to free these stuck requests so patrons get the books they want. The new version of Millennium should prevent requests from getting stuck.

The Town’s IT consultant upgraded the library’s server with a newer version of anti-virus software. After the server was updated all of the library’s PCs needed upgrading as well. During this upgrade process Lisa and I learned that viruses had infected three PCs with a Trojan virus. This virus was very clever and prevented the upgrade to new virus software. The only way to remove the virus and install the new version of the anti-virus software was to reinstall all of the software. The Town’s IT consultant performed this work using Ghost images.

Staff at the reference desk answered 327 reference questions in November. In November 2004, 324 reference questions were answered by reference staff, which is nearly identical to the 327 reference questions answer in November 2005. One person came to drop-in computer training in November and received a private lesson from Jeanne. It seems to me that more people should take advantage of these training sessions. Perhaps we need more publicity for these training sessions.

Jeanne Bracken has found that the library’s wireless network needs a signal strength boost. We will work with the Town’s IT Director, Chuck Miller, to improve the wireless network. Jeanne is also writing a wireless brochure, which will inform our patrons about this new service and explain how to patrons can connect to the library’s wireless network with their laptop computers.

Through November 30 we have spent $8,655 of the $27,000 in our maintenance budget. Most of the $5,239.20 spent in November went toward HVAC repairs. We repaired the leaking water pump and replaced the leaking Y strainers. These units are both part of the boiler system and carry water through the boiler and around the building.

Dave Gardner Contractor & Supply began work on the roof project last month, pointing masonry along the roof line of the Gund Building. The slate for the project did not arrive until December 8. A large snowstorm arrived the following day and prevented work from continuing. Now the Building Committee is

Congratulations to Dana Weigent for making the crafts for the week of December 19. Children could come to the library whenever they wanted to during this week and make the crafts. The December 22 edition of the “Lincoln Journal” featured Dana’s crafts on the front page!