Lawton Memorial Library Board Meeting

              Regular Board Meeting          Tuesday, July 26, 2022

                                                                                                  

*5:15 p.m. Chair Barbara Melvin called the meeting to order at the Lawton Memorial Library. Roll Call was taken with board members Melvin, Carol Persons, Georgia Everson, Gwendolyn Hatfield, Gail Muller, and Kimberly Walker present. Absent was Donna Niles. Also present was Librarian Lisa Ahler.     

   

*Verification of meeting posting at the Bank, Post Office, and Village Office on July 25, 2022, was given.    

  

*Hatfield moved, Muller seconded to approve the minutes from the May 24, 2022, meeting, with a correction to the date of the Vernon County Reads program, from August 24th to August 18th. (Carried).

                                   

*Financial report: Reviewed the report from 1/1/2022 thru 7/25/2022. The balance is $50,470.12. Of this amount $564.63 is Gates grant funds, $1,184.50 is Cropp grant funds, and $3,201.94 is the balance in the donations. This leaves an operating budget of $45,519.05. The savings account has $20,704.65, plus the 2 CDs of $3,982.97 and $30,592.03. On July 1st, funds, in the amount of $21,000, were moved from the regular savings to CD#1, as discussed from the May 24th meeting to get a better interest rate. The CD rate was .30% and renewed at .4508% A.P.Y. for 1 year. Persons moved, Everson seconded to approve the financial report. (Carried).  

  

*Statistical Report: Lisa reported circulation numbers are going up each month. People are in the library more, and only a few are doing curbside. Also, looked at the revenue from fines and copies, and the computer use statistics. Georgia inquired about eBook tracking and it was questioned if we receive any credit for our library on people using eBooks. Lisa will do some checking on this.      

   

*Friends Update: The June Music in the Park did very well financially. The 4th of July music was down from past years, as it didn’t have a lot of people due to the rain. They have one more Music in the Park at the end of August. The 2 library book boxes out in the village are being used. Peggy Pasker has offered to help replace or do something with the trees out front of the building. The board was unaware that Wayne Haugrud did cut some of the dead branches out and trimmed ones over the roof. It was decided to look at them again in the Fall, at the October meeting, to see what more to possibly do.       

       

*Directors Report:

**Traffic is still busy and picking up.  

**The new circulation computer arrived today and a WRLS person set it up for us. He also checked out our other computers. The children’s computers are old, from 2016. They only have 4G’s, and they need to be at least 8G’s to run different programs, etc. Lisa wanted to put this on the radar to look at replacements, which are just under $800 each. There are 3 adult and 2 kid computers. The one being used for card cataloging doesn’t need replaced. And we have a couple of laptops, but they don’t get used much. The board decided to wait for the report being done on each one, to get prices, then hold a special meeting to approve some new ones. If replace all 5, discussed using the $564.63 from the gates grant, $500 from donations, about $400 from the balance of the Cropp grant after paying for the circulation computer, and the balance from the library savings.         

**Programming: The summer reading program has 30 kids actively participating, which ends next week.  

**Page Turners Book club: Holding them in person now and outside when weather permits.  

**Knitting and Mah Jong are both going well and have good participation.

**The Take & Make bags are still very popular. Been making 30 a week, but this week made 40. Going to take a break and take the month of August off.

**Lisa added guessing jars for the summer months. Popular with the kids.            

**The Vernon County Reads is offering a bus ride to the program at the Hillsboro Community Center. If interested, call the McIntosh library.  

**Storytime: Looking to start again in September or October, on Tuesday mornings at 10 a.m. Have had mixed reactions to it, so will see how it goes.   

 

 

*Business:

**Covid Update: Vernon County is currently low. Other counties around us are at medium.  

 

**Discussion of Family Research Affiliate Library: Carol explained this is something we may want to add to our library services, to be an affiliate with Family Search International to offer the patrons a free genealogical family search for records to learn more about a person’s family history. The board thought this was a good idea. There’s some computer requirements to go along with it, so Lisa will check if the new computers have the capability to handle this. Will add this to the special meeting being planned soon for the computer purchases.   

 

*Public comments: Barb updated the board on how the public comment portion works. She had looked it up in the trustee guide. This is for someone from the public coming in and attending the meeting and wishing to talk for a short period of time. The board can have a short discussion, but no action is to be taken. If it’s a long discussion, it should be put on the agenda.              

    

*The next meeting was scheduled for October 18, 2022, at 5:15 p.m. (Budget time).  

     

*Hatfield moved, Muller seconded to adjourn. (Carried). Adjourned at 6:06 p.m.

 

                                                                        __________________________________ 

Kimberly Walker, Village Clerk/Treasurer