Management of Library Associations

43rd meeting of the Executive Committee

Minutes

1. Welcome

Executive Committee members present were:

2. Approval of the Agenda

3. Apologies for Absence

• Norma Amenu-Kpodo (Commonwealth Library Association)
• Cecile Panzer (Israel Association of Special Libraries and Documentation Centers)
• Roger Parent (American Association of Law Librarians)
• Sabine Stummeyer (Berufsverband Information Bibliothek e.V, Germany)

4. Approval of 42th RTMLA Executive Committee meeting Minutes, The Hague, Netherlands

The Chair then thanked Jan_Ewout van der Putten, his staff and everyone at IFLA HQ for contributing to a very successful, fruitful and memorable Mid-year meeting in The Hague.

5. Report from Coordinating Board meeting

6. Financial Report

7. Status Change of RTMLA to an IFLA Section

The Chair announced with pleasure our status change and gave the details received from IFLA HQ. In a letter from Ross Shimmon dated 22 February 2002, he informed the Chair that "... the Governing Board has agreed to the recommendation that your Round Table should become an IFLA Section" and went on that "... the formal change will take place at the end of the IFLA conference in Glasgow this August."

In a subsequent letter from Ross Shimmon dated 10 April, he wrote that "Since the next round of nominations for Standing Committee members is scheduled to begin in October, the Governing Board determined that there is not enough time to recruit substantial numbers of members to the new Sections to participate in the process. Therefore, the Board decided that the Round Table's current Executive Committees should function as Standing Committees as interim until the next series of elections (October 2004-Feb 2005). During the Berlin conference (August 2003) the Interim Standing Committee should elect officers (a Chair and a Secretary)."

The Chair also announced that all current Association members of IFLA will be automatically enrolled as members of the new Section free of extra charge. We will need to begin recruiting efforts for new IFLA Association members.

According to IFLA standards, our new name will be Management of Library Association Section or MLAS.

8. RTMLA Strategic Plan 2002-2002 including Scope, Mission and Goals of the new Section

9. Information Coordinator's report

Duane Webster asked that a new Information Coordinator be appointed and Jennefer Nicholson offered to take over the responsibilities. The Chair thanked Duane for his commitment and efforts these past several years.

1. Status of IFLANET RTMLA WWW site The site has been and continues to be updated, including the full text of our pamphlets and links to other materials relating to library association matters.
2. Special Libraries Association RTMLA listserv Lynn Smith, new Executive Director of the Special Libraries Association, reaffirmed their generous offer to host the RTMLA Listserv. At our Open Session and Workshop in Glasgow, we will ask those attending if they wish to be added to the RTMLA Listserv when they sign the attendance sheets. The hope was expressed that the RTMLA Listserv will be used as a forum for discussion.
3. Linking WWW home pages of member RTMLA library associations from the IFLANET RTMLA WWW site Michael Dowling offered to help with this project. There was a suggestion that a short summary in English might be helpful for those library associations that do not have English language WWW pages. There are free Internet automatic translation services on the WWW that might be used. The Secretary will send Michael the RTMLA membership spreadsheet containing some WWW library association links to begin the work.

10. Reports on RTMLA publications

1. RTMLA Membership brochure The Chair thanked Duane Webster for updating the brochure for this conference.
2. RTMLA Newsletter Duane reported that there was no RTMLA Newsletter issued this year. Hopefully, there will be one in the near future. The issue of different ways of distributing the newsletter was not discussed at this meeting
3. Brochures based on chapters of the UNESCO/RTMLA Guidelines for the Management of Professional Associations in the Fields of Archives, Library and Information Work The Chair expressed gratitude to Carla Funk for all her ceaseless efforts in editing and printing the new brochures: Programs and Services by Leacy O'Brien, and Policies and Procedures by Jennifer Joseph, and also printing all the other English language brochures for distribution at this conference. There is only one brochure, Organizational Structure, left to be done and Carla offered to write that one as well, for distribution at the IFLA 2003 Conference in Berlin.
   The Chair also thanked Briand Gerard for the French translation and printing of four brochures: 1) Conseils pour diriger et gèrer les associations de bibliothèques et de bibliothècaires; 2) Encouranger la valorisation des bibliothèques - Guide des relations avec les gouvernments; 3) Conseils pour la gestion financière des associations de bibliothèques et de bibliothècaires; and 4) Conseils pour le fonctionnement des associations de bibliothèques et de bibliothècaires. They will also be distributed at this conference.
   The Secretary will work on posting the new brochures on our RTMLA WWW site.
   The Secretary last heard from Myra Torres-Alamo, who was to do the Spanish translations in December 2001. At this point, the Secretary will try to find someone else to do the work. Sabine Stummeyer will try to find someone to do the German translation and the Chair will work on finding someone to translate them into Russian.

11. Report on IFLA 2002 Glasgow program planning

1. Open session: Realizing visions for the future: A radical change for library and information associations Marion Koren, the session Chair reported that six papers will be presented by people from six different countries. The papers scheduled are by Rob Bruijnzeels (Netherlands Public Library Association), Birgitta Olander (Lund University, Sweden), Uta Muller (University Library, Bochum, Germany); Natalie Blanchard (Gale/Thomson Learning, Australia); Bernard Dione (Ecole des Bibliothécaires, Archivistes et Documentalistes, Université Cheikh Anta Diop de Dakar, Dakar, Sénégal) and Charles Batambuze (Uganda Library Association, Kampala, Uganda) and the session will be wrapped up by Jennefer Nicholson. Marion reported that unfortunately Birgitta Olander was unable to attend and a shorter version of her paper will be presented.
2. Joint workshop with Asia and Oceania Regional Section: Current issues and activities of library association in developing countries. Four papers are scheduled for this workshop from as many countries. They are by R. Ramachandran (Congress of Southeast Asian Librarians, Singapore); Kama Urmurzina (Information Consortium of Kazakhstan Libraries); C.R. Karisiddappa (Indian Library Association) and one by Vladimir Zaitsev and Boris Marshak (Russian Library Association, St.Petersburg, Russian Federation). Unfortunately, C. R. Karisiddappa is also unable to attend due to health problems and Kalpana Dasgupta will read his paper.

12. Report on IFLA 2003 Berlin Program Planning

1. Open Session on Strategic Planning Although the workshop on Strategic Planning was not accepted for the IFLA 2002 Glasgow conference, there is strong interest in presenting it at IFLA 2003 in Berlin. Ellen Tise and Mitch Freedman agreed to chair this as an Open Session and will work on the program.
2. Session on libraries and the role of politics and politicians This program topic was proposed by Tore Andersen who will look into the possibility making it a joint session with the Public Libraries Section for either IFLA 2003 in Berlin or IFLA 2004 in Buenos Aires. He proposed as the title, Making Libraries Visible within the Political Landscape, with some piece of it having to do with cultural information.
3. Joint session with the Management and Marketing Section
   Àngels Massisimo of the IFLA Management and Marketing Section expressed interest in a joint session to explore different experiences with young membership, share the different approaches of several associations to promote themselves, and to increase and maintain their membership. Winnie Vitzansky will follow up.
4. Workshop on running a democratic library association This idea was brought up at the RTMLA 2002 mid-year meeting in The Hague, but no work has been done to date. The idea was to use the members of the RTMLA Executive Committee and invite people from both library associations with paid staff and those run by volunteers to do the session. Possibly could be a full day off-site session for the IFLA 2003 in Buenos Aires and invite national library associations from neighboring countries. This idea can be discussed at the MLAS 2003 Mid-year meeting, if there is still interest.

13. RTMLA 21st Anniversary Celebration at IFLA 2003 in Berlin

14. Funding members from developing countries to participate in RTMLA activities

15. IFLA Membership dues restructuring

16. Soros Open Society Institute Network Library Program (NPL) 2000 Initiative

17. Report on Kenya librarians Ashah Owano and Isabel F. Mulanda's research project

The report was received and will be posted on the RTMLA WWW site.

RTMLA involvement in 9th Crimea 2002 Conference and other related issues

For the second consecutive year, the RTMLA was represented at this conference that drew over 1,300 librarians. This year, the RTMLA Chair attended and presented a session that was simultaneously translated. The Chair felt it would be good if someone from the RTMLA attended next year and asked for any volunteers who might be interested.

On a broader basis, at the RTMLA 2002 Mid-year meeting in The Hague, the Executive Committee began looking at the issue of how the RTMLA can reach out and be involved with other local and regional conferences. It was proposed that guidelines for participation in conferences and workshops other than at the IFLA annual conference should be written. There was no report on the status of these guidelines.

As far as funding for participation in these activities, Carla Funk and Roger Parent agreed to work on a letter to be sent to the Organizing Committees of IFLA conferences suggesting that any surplus money earned by successful IFLA annual conferences should be used to build a fund to support these workshops. There was no status report on this.

19. RTMLA Annual Report, January 1,2002 through December 31, 2002

20. MLAS 2003 Mid-year meeting

21. Other business and reports

Ellen Tise thanked the Chair for a job well done!

22. Adjournment

The Chair expressed her appreciation to the Executive Committee for their hard work and dedication to the RTMLA and great pleasure on being transformed into a Sectpion.