Report of the Library Director for November 2008

Circulation
Circulation for November was surprisingly low, at 3,949 items. This is an 11.6% decrease from October, and a 9.8% decrease from last year. Typically we see this sort of drop in December instead of November, and my hope is that this year the gap will be from October to November, and December should be close to the same as November.

Collection Development
We added 130 items to our collection from our usual vendors in November. We also added approximately 40 young adult titles that were selected during the ULTRA annual book buying trip to Barnes and Noble.
I continue to have misgivings about our current periodicals vendor, EVA subscriptions. We currently have 6 titles that should have been renewed that we are not receiving. One of them is our daily subscription to the Wall Street Journal. I have called EVA about this issue, and I will continue to try and resolve it through them, but if I have not gotten a firm answer from them by the end of the week, I will purchase the WSJ directly from the publisher, because we have patrons asking about it.
My plan for the spring is to return to a larger subscription vendor with more favorable reviews. I will ask for bids based on our subscription list and see which of the national vendors offer the best terms.

Circulation Policy
I want to make sure that all of our patrons and especially the Library Trustees understand our current circulation policy. Our policies state that any items in our collection are available to anyone with a library card, regardless of their age. Our collection includes items intended for a wide range of interests and many items are not suitable for all patrons. Furthermore, anyone 12 and over can apply for a library card without the need for parental permission, and will be given exactly the same privileges and privacy protections as any adult.
These policies are in accord with Massachusetts State laws and ALA suggested guidelines, and I do not recommend that they be changed.
However, they do provide only limited options for parents that wish to exercise control of the content or types of materials that their children borrow. In the event that a parent expresses concern about our policies, all staff and trustees need to understand the reasoning behind our decisions and be prepared to respond to these concerns appropriately.

Programs
Library book group: will not meet until Dec 3rd.
Senior book group: 7 people met on November 4th.
Thursday storytime averaged 10 children per session.
TinyTots lapsit averaged 22 participants.
Teen Tuesday was attended by 9 young adults.
Library Table: 4 visits, averaged 5 patrons and 10 items.

Special Events in November
The Ultra collection development trip was held on November 14th at the Millbury Barnes and Noble. 7 teens attended and selected approximately four hundred dollars worth of print materials for the young adult and graphic novel collections.

Upcoming Events in December
The Food for Fines program will run from December 2nd through December 24th. During this time, we will waive all overdue fines on Upton items for any patron that donates non-perishable goods to the Upton Bloomer Girls’ annual holiday food drive. As always, we cannot waive fines on items owned by other libraries, or fees and replacement costs.

Our Closed days in December will be:
Wednesday, Dec 24th , Open 10-2, closing early
Thursday, Dec 25th , Closed
Friday, Dec 26th , Closed
Saturday, Dec 27th, Open 10-2 regular hours.

Wednesday, Dec 31st, Open 10-8 regular hours.
Thursday, Jan 1st, Closed
Regular hours on Friday Jan 2nd and Saturday Jan 3rd.

Staff
All staff have completed the survey sent out by the Personnel Board as the first step in the town-wide position reclassification process.

Personnel reviews will be held for all staff except Matthew the week of Dec 15th- 19th.


Plans for Next Month

1) Staff reviews and annual report completed.

2) Begin budget process for FY10.

3) Continue withdrawing items from the storage collection.