Circulation Committee Meeting Minutes – March 14, 2023

Posting Circ Contact Information on IT Wiki

Allison asked if anyone has any objection to her posting a link to the contact information sheet on the IT Wiki. No one objected.

Missing Items on the Holds Shelf

When staff are pulling expired items on the Clear Holds Shelf sometimes items are not there. If an item isn’t there, please follow these steps:

  1. Contact the patron to see if they have the item at home. If they do, check it out to them.
  2. If the patron doesn’t have it, contact the owning library to see if the item is there.
  3. Set the item to “Missing” if previous steps were unsuccessful. This should be a last resort as sometimes it’s confusing to figure out where an item went missing if the owning library isn’t the one who changed the status.
Check-In Modifiers

Allison asked which check-in modifiers libraries use. The ones that seem to be used are Amnesty Mode (for the libraries that are fine-free), Auto-Print Holds and Transit Slips, and Clear Holds Shelf. The libraries that always use Clear Holds Shelf report that there are no issues with leaving it on. Lindsay thanked everyone for their feedback on that. Her recommendation is to limit any modifiers that may be running processes in the background. Allison stressed that the Retarget Local Holds modifiers should ONLY be used after processing an item.

Staggering VDI Sign-Ins

When lots of staff are trying to log into VDI at the same time, it overloads the server and causes a “boot storm.” This causes slow log-in times and a delay in printers populating. It is recommended that staff stagger the times they are logging in, especially around the 10:00 opening time. Allison sent an email about this issue earlier today.

Patron Stat Cats

Every patron has a profile that sets permissions for circulation, holds, and expiration date. We have also set up Statistical Categories (Stat Cats) that libraries use to gather data about their patrons, including the monthly counts of added borrowers that display on the WLS Data Dashboard. A few examples are Contract, Nonresident, Individuals, etc. Some of these Statistical Categories only apply to certain libraries. Stat cats do not affect circulation in any way.

Stat cats only display at the very bottom of the Edit screen in drop down menus so the information is difficult for staff to access. If a patron moves from one library to another within the county, it’s difficult to clean up stat cats that don’t apply any more.

Lindsay and Allison have been talking about cleaning up these stat cats and possibly making changes to the way we use them. There are probably easier ways to get needed patron statistics without using stat cats, On the Annual Report, statistics need to be reported on resident and non-resident library card holders. Lindsay is working on reports for each library that will give libraries counts of patrons with stat cats and lists by individual patron so that they can be cleaned up. We need to consider what makes sense long-term with how we use Evergreen’s features.

On a related note, libraries are noticing that there are patrons with expired cards that should have been purged but haven’t been. The extension of expiration dates during COVID may have affected this process. Lindsay is looking into this.

Allison demonstrated how to use the Patron Search screen in Evergreen to find patrons that may have some weirdness in their profile. You can search for data entry that needs cleanup, like your library patrons that have NEW YORK in the State field, and fix it on the fly. As an alternative to cloning a template and running reports, you can also add needed columns, perform a search, and download a csv file to open in a spreadsheet to view borrower records that need to be updated. For example, add mailing address columns and search for users with the profile Adult at your library.

Microsoft 365

This will be coming to all library staff who currently use VDI in the next few weeks. Allison will send a link to the Quick Start Guide that’s also available in the Microsoft Office information the IT Wiki. Currently, sign in is required every time a staff member signs into a new VDI session when they use a Microsoft program, i.e. Word, Excel, etc. They will sign in with their WLS credentials: firstname.lastname@westchesterlibraries.org

This is due to changes Microsoft made to their pricing and licensing. The Microsoft products will only be available to staff.

Transit Lists

Reminder for all libraries to check their Transit List. Please check the transits to your library and transits from your library. Then look on the shelves for the items and clean them up. Instructions are on IT Wiki for accessing and processing Transit Lists.

Helpdesk

Reminder that the Helpdesk is only to be used by staff through emailing or calling. It’s easier to get a request answered by emailing support@wlsmail.org or emailing the specific WLS department email
address that each Director was given recently.

Discussion and Q&A
  • Some people have issues signing into the Microsoft Teams app. Going in through the browser may work better.
  • GRE Lockers – going well for staff and most patrons.
Announcements
  • Lori Gagliano (SCA) is retiring – we all wish her well!
  • Yonkers is getting a new logo and new library cards.

The next Circ Committee meeting is scheduled for May 9th . There will be information at this meeting regarding an Evergreen upgrade to version 3.10.

Respectfully Submitted,
Marie Trapasso
OSS