Circulation Committee Minutes

MEMBER INTRODUCTIONS: New Circulation member from YRK, Tamara

UPDATES AND DEMOS

  1. Patron and Catalog cleanup ongoing.  The purpose of the project is to clean up circulation modifiers; there are a lot of duplicative ones in the system now that are serving no purposes. Circulation modifiers just control things like the loan period, the amount of renewals allowed, and the fine structure.  The fewer rules, the simpler, and the better the system will run, so if there are different circ mods that have the same rules (loan period, renewals, etc) they should be combined.  This is a back-end matter that is not reflected in any of the catalogs the patrons see.  New items added to the catalog will have the new modifiers; older items will be changed by a batch update from the vendor.  WLS is not rushing into this.  Lindsay asked for a list of tech services people in the different libraries, so WLS can get their input before making changes, which will not go into effect until 2025 at the earliest. Libraries can help this process by checking to see if items are connected to the right circ mods by cloning these templates and running reports
    1. Shelf List by Shelving Location
    2. Shelf List by Shelving Location and Call Number Range
  2. Patron records are also being reviewed for email addresses and notification issues.  This will be more important in the next few months because a new service to handle text notifications is coming. Libraries can also do a patron database cleanup to see if there are weird errors by cloning these templates and running reports
    1. Patron Email List
    2. User List With Address, Email, Phone Numbers
  3. Discussion of old lost items and how their records clog the system.  Laura Burk at GRE will share that library’s process for removing old lost items from their catalog.

STAFF CHANGES AT WLS

  1. Allison Midgley will move to a more administrative role, handling digital resources and data management for WLS instead of training.
  2. Allison Pryor and Lindsay Stratton are going to be working on the ILS and the Aspen catalog.  Allison Pryor is working toward a new mobile app and ongoing catalog support.
  3. With respect to trainings, there will be changes to training options. Evergreen trainings will be quarterly and more limited in scope. There will be a survey sent out about whether people prefer virtual or in person training; there won’t be hybrid training in the future.

REMINDERS

  1. Fine Free and Auto Renewal: you can find out which libraries are fine free in the Solarwinds portal, which has a list of Fine free libraries.  A majority of libraries in the system are fine free at this point. Unless the library has its own specific policies, the system wide default is fine free and automatic renewal.  There are four libraries that don’t do automatic renewals.
  2. Question about whether pre-due notices to patrons are necessary if library has automatic renewals; this has not been changed, and this will need more discussion regarding pros and cons.
  3. Reminder that ONLY people who have an email address in their profile get notices regarding due dates and renewals; they get emails for these things regardless of whether they’re set up to get email hold notices.
  4. Changes in Hours:  If your library’s hours have changed for fall and winter, put in a request to the help desk to change the hours.  This is separate from your Aspen listings; the Aspen administrator at your library has to do that.  If you would like to set up your 2025 closings, feel free.
  5. Contact Information: Please check to make sure the listings for Circulation Committee members in the IT Wiki listing are correct; suggestion to add a column for the tech people at each library to the IT Wiki.  If you need to change your Circulation Contacts listed in the Wiki,  contact the Help Desk.
  6. Contacting Help: The best way to contact support is through Solarwinds; it’s better NOT to email an individual directly, because that leads to delays. If you have trouble getting into Solarwinds, send an email to the help desk to get set up properly.
  7. Purging Patrons: Discussion about whether in rare events a library can purge a patron’s record.  Lindsay is setting up another manual patron purge; the thing that has slowed that down is expired patrons still using online resources.  The recommendation is  to NOT purge patrons, because you then lose all their statistics, which is bad for the library in general. In the event a library wants to purge a patron, they can
    1. set the patron’s expiration date for today, and then 18 months later, if there are no fines, holds or loans, the patron will be purged.
    2. Alternately, a library can put multiple accounts in a user bucket and mark them as deleted.

DISCUSSION, Q &A

  • WNR Children’s Room – only partial collection is available at the present; call the library before sending people there.
  • TUK – Getting ready to move back into their building
  • Barcode problems:  A couple of libraries complained about the last batch of barcodes which faded almost immediately and were impossible to read.  Another library had a batch with blurs on the barcodes, which caused the library to run out of usable barcodes. One library suggested to cover the barcodes with clear tape to protect them.  A couple of libraries complained that the numbers on the barcodes are smaller and harder to read. Allison Midgley will speak to Wilson about this.
    **Follow-up: Please have your library contact Wilson immediately if you have issues with your barcode order.**

Next Meeting:  Nov 12, 2024, 9:30 to 11:00 a.m., hybrid