Minutes of the FAC Meeting - January 18, 2001 FAC Present: FLICC/FEDLINK Present Maxine Brown (Chair) Susan Tarr Denise Lomax Steve Kerchoff Bonnie Klein Joseph Banks Sheila Riley Cheryl Thomas Judy Bullwinkle (by phone) Fred Rettenmaier Louise LeTendre Carla Pomager AGENDA 1. Approval of the December 14, 2000 FAC Meeting Minutes - FAC 2. FAC Issues and Topics - Maxine Brown, Chair -Election of new FAC Chair, Vice Chair and Secretary -Spring FEDLINK Membership Meeting: April 17, 2001 Topic? -Final approval of FAC meeting dates for CY2001 3. FLICC/FEDLINK Update Issues -Susan Tarr, FLICC Executive Director & FEDLINK Staff a. Revolving Fund, P.L. 106-481, Sect. 103 (Tarr) b. OCLC Deficits (Tarr) c. Consortium update (Kathy Eighmey/Steve Kerchoff) d. ALA Midwinter activities/Vendors' 10 Reasons (Tarr) e. Preservation Services SOW 4. Committee Reports -Content Management Working Group FAC liaison? 5. Old Business 6. New Business 1. Approval of the December 14, 2000, FAC Meeting Minutes - - FAC The FAC approved the minutes of the December 14, 2000 meeting as amended to reflect that FAC members, Maxine Brown, Judy Bullwinkle, and Louise LeTendre's presence was by phone. The minutes raised several points. Susan Tarr said the slate of nominees for the FEDLINK delegate to the OCLC Users Council will be completed soon. Louise LeTendre inquired whether OCLC could repeat a Directors Institute they sponsored several years ago at ALA. She will locate the program information to give to Susan Tarr. OCLC Vice-President, George Needham will speak at the OCLC Users Group Meeting on April 17th rather than in the morning. 2. FAC Issues and Topics - Maxine Brown, Chair -Election of new FAC Chair, Vice Chair and Secretary Maxine Brown reviewed the responsibilities of the FAC Chair and noted the importance of having the Vice-Chair as back-up. She stated her appreciation for Ken Nero's outstanding support as her Vice-Chair. Fred Rettenmaier related his positive experience as FAC Chair and both he and Maxine noted that the Chair is ably assisted by the FEDLINK Network Coordinator and Anna Bohlin. Bonnie Klein and Denise Lomax and Carla Pomager were nominated respectively for FAC Chair, Vice-Chair and Secretary. The slate was enthusiastically approved by the FAC. Changes to the FAC include Judy Bullwinkle's election, Maxine Brown's re-election, and Ken Nero's completion of term and his election to the FLICC Executive Board. On behalf of the FAC, Bonnie Klein commended the excellent service provided by Maxine Brown as Chair and Sheila Riley as Secretary. -Spring FEDLINK Membership Meeting: April 17, 2001 Topic? The FAC discussed inviting a high ranking public figure to address the membership on topics relevant to information and focused on First Lady, Laura Bush, who is a librarian. Susan Tarr noted that sending her an invitation would get her attention and that of her scheduling staff but cautioned that changes in schedules of high-profile speakers can result in cancellations. She suggested that we try this but also make back-up plans. Other ideas included ALA President Nancy Kranich or SLA President, Donna Scheeder. Susan Tarr noted said that Donna Scheeder gave a wonderful presentation on librarian competencies at SLA. The FAC agreed that Susan Tarr should ask Donna Scheeder. Other FEDLINK meeting topic ideas included library consortia with a speaker from academia; the relevance of libraries in support of agency missions; dotcom issues and a presentation on the tension between libraries needing to link to dotcoms to deliver services and the restrictions agencies put on their libraries; the transition of libraries into the 21st century with its myriad resources and how libraries can compete with internet search engines; E-books and their acceptability to users; the impact of and finding of gray literature; NCLIS and the basic information policy direction for the Federal Government; and ALA Washington Office speaker on tracking information policies at the national level. Carla Pomager asked about restrictions on dotcom use of agency logos in the following scenario: When an agency contracts for a dotcom's database services and they create a entrance for the agency on the dotcom server, can the dotcom use the agency logo? Only agency users would see the agency logo. This is an important question because allowing this would let agency users know that the service is provided by the agency library. Susan Tarr agreed to look into this. Bonnie Klein said that she missed having a summary of what was said at the FLICC Forums and noted that the issues and statements are important. Susan Tarr will also check on this. -Final approval of FAC meeting dates for CY2001 Bonnie Klein assumed the position of Chair for the remainder of the meeting. The FAC reviewed the list of meeting dates. Since March 15th coincides with the Computers in Libraries Conference, the FAC voted to cancel this meeting. Other potential conflicts include July 12th which is the same day as an Information Technology all-day education program and November 8th which is the third day of 3-day program. The FAC decided to postpone decisions about the cancellation of these meetings. 3. FLICC/FEDLINK Update Issues -Susan Tarr, FLICC Executive Director & FEDLINK Staff a. Revolving Fund, P.L. 106-481, Sect. 103 (Tarr) See handouts. Susan Tarr reviewed the specifics of the new law which was signed by the President on November 9th. Section 103 covers FEDLINK. Beginning on October 1, 2001 FEDLINK will be able to operate its administrative budget "without fiscal year limitation " (Sect. 103(e)). Revenue earned to operate FEDLINK in one fiscal year will not "lapse" at the end of the fiscal year and can continue to support the program. The law allows the ability to plan over a longer term than one fiscal year and may give more opportunities in contracting. It may also allow for a simpler registration process. FEDLINK will effect an information campaign in the spring. Answers are needed from Financial Services and the General Counsels Office before member communication can take place. FEDLINK will be pressed to get the basics up the first year and a big challenge will be their DOS-based financial system and the need to move into a much changed financial situation. To FAC questions regarding the use of new purchase tools (e.g. credit cards and military purchasing methods), Susan responded that FEDLINK will eventually look at a variety of purchase vehicles. One caution is whether auditors and attorneys will allow broader interpretation of the law as it applies to federal agencies purchasing with one-year funds. The law clearly requires a "bona fide need" for whatever the agency is purchasing at the time funds are obligated to FEDLINK for particular services. The question becomes if that need changes or if there is money left over, is that money available for things that were not bona fide needs at the time money was given? Susan asked the FAC to review the law and to ask questions. She wants to know more about what this law looks like from the outside. Contact her about this on the Listserv. b. OCLC Deficits (Tarr and Banks) Joseph Banks distributed the first quarter budget figures. He stated that the OCLC deficits were in the amount of @$60,000 and that the next concern was cost overruns. Susan Tarr explained that FEDLINK has an agreement with OCLC to pay when there is usage, an agreement not contingent on whether agencies have funds in place. Triggered by OCLC usage statistics, FEDLINK checks to see if an IAG has been signed. Susan informed the FAC of the results of sending letters to the 128 deficit members (as the FAC advised). The letter asked these members to stop OCLC activity. A second letter was sent in December and the number of deficit members lessened to 50. A third and final letter was sent in January stating that deficit members had ten working days to put an IAG in place or FEDLINK would be required to shut down their OCLC service on January 26th. Susan will give the FAC a copy of the letter sent to the deficit membership. c. Consortium update (Steve Kerchoff) FEDLINK's consortium solicitation for INSPEC services closes January 31st. INSPEC asked for a narrower range of potential users, so FEDLINK changed their original estimate from "4000 to 10,000" to 8400. FEDLINK would also like a contract provision that INSPEC pricing would decrease as new consortial members are added. ProQuest now has 38 Department of Defense libraries signed and FEDLINK is looking to receive a proposal from UMI There is also a proposal to purchase FirstSearch as a consortium; a meeting was held with the FLICC Information Technology Working Group, FEDLINK, and OCLC where issues were raised. d. ALA Midwinter activities/Vendors' 10 Reasons (Tarr) FEDLINK shared the LC booth and held two vendor sessions. On Saturday they saw 16-18 current vendors and gave handouts on the revolving fund legislation. On Sunday they held a prospective vendors session and gave a handout listing "Ten Reasons to be a FEDLINK Vendor." They spoke with 2 vendors. The British Library discussed coming back as a document delivery service. Softline, a small West Coast vendor, offered databases on ethnic and gender issues. FEDLINK had one staff member at the booth at all times as well as staff at the Federal Librarians Round Table meetings. Steve Kerchoff attended the GPO and OCLC digital archive meeting. Susan Tarr attended a RONDAC breakfast with Jay Jordan and met with OCLC's General Counsel to talk about a new contract. Prior to the OCLC pre-conference on digital reference, FLICC hosted a successful luncheon for Federal librarians who were not LC librarians, inviting @60 on the OCLC attendee list. Costs were covered by a FLICC Gift Fund. e. Preservation Services SOW See draft Statement of Work prepared by the FLICC Preservation Working Group. The Working Group will serve as the technical review team to evaluate responses. 4. Committee Reports Cheryl Thomas volunteered to be the FAC liaison for the FLICC Content Management Working Group. This ad hoc group was charged to make recommendations to FLICC on cooperative activities related to content management, including FirstGov and other central federal information portal initiatives by March 20th. Fred Rettenmaier volunteered to serve as the FAC Liaison for the FLICC Budget Working Group. Susan Tarr reported that the Personnel Working Group effected a change in the Librarian qualification standards but OPM did not take their recommendation to put the GS-1410 series under the professional and scientific category. OPM published the GS-07 qualifications as recommended and added a chart for GS-09 and above. OPM has issued the standard to agencies. 5. Old Business Robin Hatziyannis will present the Web design analysis at the February 22nd FAC meeting. 6. New Business None. 7. Announcements Maxine Brown announced her participation in the Avon Breast Cancer 3-day walk. The next FAC meeting is February 22nd from 1:00 - 3:30 p.m. The FLICC Quarterly meeting is that morning. The meeting adjourned at 11:35 p.m. Minutes prepared by Sheila M. Riley, FEDLINK Advisory Council (FAC)