Report of the Library Director for January 2012

Circulation rises slightly – applications arrive – juvenile VHS withdrawn

Circulation
Circulation for January was 3,775. This is slightly more than last month (9.9% increase), and last year (3.1% increase). 645 interlibrary loan holds were placed.
Our laptops were checked out 21 times in January, and our Nook e-readers circulated 8 times.

Digital Content Use
BYKI: In January, 15 users accessed byki for a total of 23 hours. Our top languages were German, French and Spanish.
Wowbrary: 5 new users signed up for Wowbrary, for a total of 99 active subscribers.
Overdrive: eBook circulation to Upton patrons: 100, eAudio circulations: 25.

New Patron Registrations
19 new patrons registered in January.

Collection Development
We added approximately 114 items to our collection in January.
Passport Applications Processed in January: 32

Programs
Library book group: 6 people met on January 25th.
Senior book group: 4 people met on January 3rd.
Thursday storytime averaged 3 children per session for 5 sessions.
TinyTots lapsit is not held until we have a children’s librarian.
Library Table: 4 visits, averaged 10 patrons and 28 items.
Lego Days: averaged 6 children per session for 4 sessions.

Special Events
Parents and Students in the Spanish Immersion Program organized an evening storytime which was attended by 10 children on January 19th.

Upcoming Events in February
Evergreen staff training session, February 6th.
Spanish storytime, February 16th.

Plans for Next Month
1) Schedule Children’s Program
2) Interviews for Children’s Librarian
3) Storage organization


Children’s Librarian Position
Applications for Children’s Librarian have been received. The next steps are to select which candidates to interview, create a list of interview questions, and schedule the interviews.

Collection Development
During January, I withdrew from the collection all of our remaining Juvenile Cassette tapes, and 80% of our Juvenile VHS tapes. These withdrawals allowed me to shift around the audio visual collection to provide more space for Adult TV Shows, Adult Audiobooks and Juvenile Audiobooks.
I retained about 50 juvenile VHS tapes, mostly classics and titles we have not yet purchased in DVD format.

Videogame collection
The videogame collection of 14 titles circulated 40 times during January. We rarely have more than 1 or 2 titles on the shelf. I plan on adding 2-3 titles per month to this collection.

Children's Program Idea
I received a call from a performer who teaches baby sign language classes. The classes are designed for parents and pre-verbal infants. The class is taught by Sheryl White (www.babykneads.com). The cost for a 4 week class would be $475.
I thought this program would make a good temporary replacement for tinytots on Friday mornings. I’d like to recommend that we approach the Friends of the Library and see if they will split the cost with us, so the Trustees would need to approve spending $238 on the program.

Public Restrooms
The library has received a number of complaints about messes being left in the public restrooms from patrons and from other town employees in the building. After talking with the Board of Health staff and with the Town Manager, it has been decided that instead of having a public Men's room and Ladies' room, the two restrooms will be changed to be a unisex Staff bathroom and unisex Public restroom.
This system has been in place for about two weeks, and so far there have been no patron comments about the change.