Minutes of the NOVEL SC Conference Call
Tuesday, July 27, 2004

PRESENT: Alrutz, Baaklini, Cunningham, Douglas, Ericson, Hiebing, Kaplan, Knight, Little, McCain, Redmond, Shaloiko, Storms, Todd, Welch

ABSENT: Borges, Brink, Cannell, Courtney, Crumlish, Desch, Ebert, Hatch, Huxley, Janowsky, Johns, Kadamus, Lynch, Meierhoffer, Monahan, Nichols, Roe, Walsh

RECORDER: Petrocelli

WELCOME & APPROVAL OF MINUTES

• Dottie Hiebing called the meeting to order.
• Committee moved to approve Minutes from May 19 and June 10. Minutes were approved.

LEGISLATIVE UPDATE

• Janet Welch reported.
  • Budget: There is nothing new to report as there is still no action on the State budget. This is a very serious issue for us because of the 5% proposed cut in State funding for libraries. As long as there is no budget, we are required to operate under the 5% cut. NYLA posted some information on their web site encouraging library supporters to keep library issue in front of legislators. There is the possibility that we will operate throughout the year on a contingency budget.
  • License plate bill has passed both houses of the Legislature: Funds generated would go to public library systems for the Summer Reading Program.
  • Technical Amendment Bill re library aid: There is an SED bill under discussion with Governor and legislature re library aid. This bill would streamline library aid payments and establish payment dates in law.

NOVEL SC MEMBER TERMS

• Six Steering Committee members' terms will expire in 2004: Mary Brink, Jeff Cannell, Loretta Ebert, Sara Kelly Johns, John Monahan, and Gerry Nichols. Our meeting in September will include a celebration of the progress of the NOVEL SC and a farewell to members whose terms are expiring. Janet, Carol, and Dottie will meet and discuss sending special invitations to those members. Member terms are listed on the NOVEL web site at. http://www.nysl.nysed.gov/library/novel/steering.htm#membership

REPORT ON PORTAL DEMOS

• Thank you to Soumaya for making the vendor demonstrations possible! Seven vendors demonstrated federated searching and/or portal software. Bill Crumlish provided an excellent summary of the demonstrations. In addition, five attendees submitted evaluations. Randy Ericson will put his summary in writing and share with NOVEL-SC. Thirty people attended, 11 of which were representatives from the NOVEL Steering Committee. A poll of NOVEL SC representatives resulted in members wanting to hear more from the following vendors: Webfeat, AutoGraphics, Fretwell-Downing, Serials Solutions. John Shaloiko pointed out that the vendors gave brief but not thorough overviews - so we need to look more closely at products before making decisions. Internal Team will discuss at meeting later today. Research Library will report on Internal Team re recommendations for next steps at September meeting.
• Tom Alrutz said there was some confusion about the purpose of the demonstrations and what they may mean for State Library and for NOVEL. It is important for the NOVEL Portal group to clarify what it is looking for in terms of a portal. People were getting bits of information and getting confused about the focus of NOVEL Steering Committee which is on developing a portal which may include enhancements such as a federated searching capability and the focus of the Research Library, which is looking at federated searching for its databases. Information is on web site in Minutes but most people have not read. Dottie suggested possibly pulling out information from Minutes and creating a summary of the attributes of a NOVEL portal that the Steering Committee is investigating for the September meeting.

NECAT REPORT

• Kate Storms reported that the biggest concern at the last NECAT meeting was NECAT members not understanding what the Steering Committee wanted in terms of a federated search product overview. The last NECAT meeting in early June was focused primarily on demos by Grolier and Encyclopedia Britannica. State Library Internal Team Database Team will discuss the federated searching demos and next steps. The role of NECAT in recommending a federated searching product needs to be determined. Kate Storms will work on scheduling next NECAT meeting for September or October. An agenda will be set jointly with the Internal Databases Team.
• The issue of portal and federated searching has risen to the forefront - the electronic resources group needs to be aware of what is going on so that members of electronic resources group can impact on portal group. We need to think about whether the two groups should merge.
• DMV Authentication: State Library staff have been testing the DMV authentication at the State Library to be sure it works. They will also need to test it remotely before it can be implemented statewide. The Library staff are also discussing language that should surround this authentication piece on the NOVEL web site and in any information distributed about it. In preparing a fact sheet on access to the NOVEL databases, it is important to keep in mind recommendations made by the Electronic Resources group; for example, there should be a link/information on to how to obtain non-driver photo ID. The Steering Committee also suggested we connect with DMV to partner with us on press and promotion of this added access. Cara Janowsky was going to make changes some changes to feedback form (refer to page 2 of June Minutes). Marilyn Douglas will follow-up with Cara.

NYLA CONFERENCE PROGRAM AND POSTER SESSION

• The NOVEL Steering Committee is sponsoring a program at NYLA on Thursday, October 21, from 4:30-5:45 PM. in the Eastman Room, Clarion Hotel. The program is entitled, "NOVEL and Digitization: What's Next for New York's Libraries," and will feature Liz Bishoff, former Director of the Colorado Digitization Project and currently Vice President of Digital Collections and Metadata Services at OCLC. Liz will offer advice on collaborating to develop great digitization projects in New York. Her presentation will be followed by an update from the State Library on NOVEL and other initiatives. Moderator of the program will be Dottie Hiebing. There will be a flyer alerting people of this program. Liz Bishoff will also be the speaker at METRO's annual meeting on November 1.
• There will be a NYLA poster session on October 22, from 1:30-3:00 PM. So far, only Wanda Knight has volunteered to staff it. Please let Dottie know if you would be available to help staff the poster session for all or part of the time.

**SPEAKER'S BUREAU UPDATE**

• Linda Todd has been working with NOVEL grants and is in the process of creating a chart which will show us which library systems got database training, what training they are doing, target audience, etc. Timeframe for the grants is September to May.
• John Shaloiko said that Southeastern has registered two domains - www.nynovel.org and www.novelny.org

NOVEL STATISTICS

• Janet congratulated NOVEL Steering Committee members for their hard work, which has resulted in latest statistics showing that use of NOVEL has doubled! These statistics are available on the NOVEL web site as part of the NOVEL toolkit at http://www.nysl.nysed.gov/library/novel/toolkit/use.htm

FUTURE MEETINGS:

Tuesday, September 14, 2004, 10:30 AM Meeting, East Greenbush Community Library

Thursday, October 14, 2004, 10:00 AM Conference Call

NYLA Conference, October 21-22, 2004, Rochester

Meeting adjourned at 11:00 AM.