Library Board of Trustees

Amesbury Public Library Board of Trustees Meeting Minutes v3 - February 2022 RECEIVED Amesbury Public Library Board of Trustees Location: Amesbury Public Library, Amesbury Room By City Clerk at 1:52 pm, 3/10/22 Wednesday February 9, 2022 7:00 PM Board of Trustees (BOT) Members present: Anne Campbell, Audrey Proctor, Bethany Sullivan, Brenda Rich (BR), Delia Rinaldi, Laurie Cameron, Pam Gilday Members Not in Attendance: Gail Browne APL Director: Aimie Westphal - present I. Call to order at 7:00 PM by Anne as chair. Introductions and welcome new Trustee Jessica Ducrow. II. Secretary’s minutes. Anne makes request for 3 amendments. Discussion. Bethany motions to accept the minutes with the 3 corrections as noted by Anne. Second by Laurie. Unanimous with Jessica abstaining. III. Communications There was no email received this month in the BOT’s email account - librarytrustees@amesburyma.gov IV Budget report: Aimie presents her FY22 monthly budget report for February. Discussion of downstairs estimates and funding. Separate architect estimate and engineering estimate were received. Capital projects for the year (front stair repair and window replacement projects) had to be put on hold while water infiltration and lintel issues were investigated etc. City Council granted funds (2021-095) to cover the consultant fees but the actual total of the architect and engineering consultants came in a bit higher than the requested amount. May need to request additional funds to cover or may seek to cover the gap with other funding – gap estimate is approximately $3,800. V. Director’s report: Masks are no longer required in the building – City-wide change, including APL. Masks are optional. Staffing change – Head of Public Services (Lucas) has moved on. Aimie is not filling the Head of Public Services position. She instead wants to fill the Assistant Director position first and then reassess staffing levels. The AD position isn't a direct replacement for the HPS position. New pages from AHS and new senior tax write-off volunteer have started and are great! VI. New Business 1  Amesbury Public Library Board of Trustees Meeting Minutes v3 - February 2022 Long range planning update – online SOAR workshop is scheduled for February 15 – brainstorming session with small breakout rooms, there will only be one SOAR meeting, all Trustees will be invited and encouraged to attend if you can, meeting to be a 2-hour session. Policy review proposal – Aimie is looking at all the Amesbury Public Library policies now. Some are dated. She will bring one each to our monthly meetings going forward for description and discussion etc. Bylaws update – Bethany has transcribed the paper copy Board of Trustees Bylaws into digital form (thank you Bethany!) and has made some very minor editorial updates (capitalization uniformity). She will be mailing a copy of the Bylaws to all Trustees. Be ready to vote on the Bylaws (and any proposed edits presented) at the next regularly scheduled Board of Trustees meeting (scheduled for March 9/2nd Wednesday of month). Note that we had earlier discussed adding our Bylaws to our City of Amesbury web page. VII. Committee reports: Preservation committee – Aimie presents on behalf of Gail. Committee met January 25 for about an hour with Meghan Fahey. Discussed ongoing preservation projects and capital improvements with Meghan and Aimie. Planning to submit same capital improvement requests in FY23 to City as the FY22 improvements (downstairs) could not be made this year because of the discovered water infiltration on back wall and with lintel etc. Meghan proposed to the committee that instead of meeting monthly we meet 4 times this year (counting this January 25 meeting), with building walkthroughs at 2 of those meetings, as below:  April 26 – biannual walk-through – 1. building walkthrough interior and exterior. 2. Business meeting – acquisitions/deaccessions to collection  September 27 - biannual walk-through – 1. building walkthrough interior and exterior. 2. Business meeting – acquisitions/deaccessions to collection  December 6 – capital planning and preservation projects – 1. Presentation of annual capital improvement plan. 2 Proposal of preservation priorities for trust fund expenditures. The Committee discussed and agreed to the change. The Committee did a tour of the downstairs with Meghan at the conclusion of the meeting. VIII. Matters not reasonably anticipated in advance of the meeting Aimie requests up to $6,000 to replace 4 computers – 3 for staff and 1 at reference desk. Computers to be acquired under the City’s Dell Premiere arrangement and all to be spec’d by the City IT Director Tim McCue. Bethany motions to approve up to $6000 to replace the 4 computers. Brenda seconds. Unanimous. Committee assignments for Jessica – Director review and Finance. 2  Amesbury Public Library Board of Trustees Meeting Minutes v3 - February 2022 IX. Adjourn: 8:14 PM. Motion to adjourn by Laurie. Seconded by Delia. Unanimous. 3