all right good evening everyone thank you for joining so I am going to call this meeting to order uh this meeting has been advertised in accordance with New Jersey open public meetings act and is publicly accessible in accordance with law roll call please uh Kevin here Roco salano absent David cadino absent Dr George here Sarah no no Maria not on I am here Zab here Maddie here mayor Walker is out uh Frank Weber here thank you and did you get Dr George yeah I did oh you did I didn't okay salute to FL I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America to republ stand One Nation God indivisible indivisible liy Justice thank you okay so we don't have anything for executive session we will go right into approval of minutes from last month uh so I will ask for a motion to approve the regular meeting minutes as well as the executive session meet meeting minutes do I have a motion whoever mve thank you a second uh second I'll second it then okay um discussion so let's just quickly discuss um Chris we had some questions regarding meeting minutes sure so in the past you had stated that if someone was is not here for that meeting they can still approve the meeting minutes because they're basically accepting them to be recorded is that correct that is correct you do not need to have been here you need to have reviewed the minutes and agree or trust that they are reflective of what happened and does the same go for making a motion so if if someone wasn't here in Prior month can they still make a motion or second it such as for the minute to me for the minutes yes yes okay so it's the same it's the same thing this so I just wanted to cover that off because there was some questions I don't know if anybody had any discussion regarding minutes or that detail okay with that I'll ask for roll call Kevin yes Dr George yes I will say yes Zab here okay Maddie yes Frank yes thank you okay all right moving on to Personnel items um so do we want to bul these in any way no I guess we'll take them one at a time right um so I'll ask for a motion for item a I'll make the motion thank you second this resignation of the PDM Library um okay any discussion roll call please Dr George yes I will say yes Zab yes Maddie yes Frank yes yes okay and accept the resignation of another perdm library assistant um motion I'll make Mo thank you second hi second thank you that yes any discussion roll call uh I will say yes Zab D yes okay thank sorry my no problem Maddie yes Frank yes Kevin yes Dr George yes thank you okay so the appointments they're all Library assistants to lence Harbor does anyone have any objection to uh if I ask for a motion for CD and E I'm good with that motion I'll make the motion thank you second I'll second it thank you okay any discussion roll call please uh zad yes Maddie yes Frank yes Kevin yes Dr George yes and I am a yes okay okay moving on to finance action on the July 10th Bill listing in the amount of 23685 773 um usually Maria makes the motion on this and advises if she had any concerns I reached out to her I did not hear anything I did not see any email or anything regarding any questions were there any there were no questions there were no questions this month so pleas on that someone want to make a motion I'll make the motion thank you uh do I have a second okay I'll second any discussion roll call please Maddie Frank uh pass yes uh Kevin yes Dr George no no no no okay Zab yes go back to pass oh Frank abstain thank you all right moving on uh old business anything for old business nothing okay we'll move on to new business Library website okay um I got a couple things under new business one I noticed today when I looked at it do we post the actual agenda on the web page uh I know the meeting information is there but in Fair not that I think we've ever had a complaint about it but it would seem it would make sense that once the agenda goes out to the uh trustees it should be posted online as well so that if somebody who wants to observe how the meeting goes uh and what the issues are when a major issue comes up for expense or anything like that it would be prudent for from my standpoint to at least have that on the agenda at the same time it's released uh to the uh trustee it is when's where is it where is it on the it's not right in your face you got the thing you gotta go to board and go to minutes in agendas on the township website and also the library website so on the library website it's on the you have to go to library website go to board and it's on the agendas which is similar to what the Board of Ed and others do as well yeah all right is that posted is that posted the same time it's that posted the same time it goes out the board members right it's probably right right after yeah okay all right uh that's all I have right now okay do you want me to yeah jump okay so the reason um that I put um with the website is that we have two projects that have been um delayed for a bit and they're becoming kind of critical and that's why I wanted to make sure that they were um put in today so uh the website the issue that we have with our website and I know that Maria had asked at one point why we were still paying the vendor for the maintenance of our website and the issue is now I'm sorry now that we have um an information technology manager the issue with our website is it is a WordPress website that has had a lot of special code layered on top of it and because that code is proprietary to the vendor we're not able to get in and make any changes so essentially if we got rid of them right now we would have no website so the solution to this is because it's very easy for us to go in and make the changes and start making the massive changes that we want to to our website and that's before you get to a full redesign a full redesign is a big project that takes a lot of community response and that can take up to a year to get done what I'm talking about is just the organization of the website our last um figure that I got was so far this year we had almost 500,000 hits on our website so our website is getting used and right now it's just confusing it's not late out it's not the best for um people with special needs that kind of thing so what we need to do is take control of it back that involves building a duplicate that um has all the functionality that ours has and then we'll be able to tell the vendor that we're no longer going with them and take over doing all the maintenance ourselves and then when we get to a full redesign that's a matter that we'll discuss with the board but this right now is just so we can stop paying $4,000 a year for someone else to delay Us in making changes to our website instead we can just make them ourselves and do we own the domain name we do we do the domain we have that's that's not an issue and the any changes that we make particularly with this new catalog coming in um it takes us days to get any kind of response from the vendor so we really this is really critical that we're able to make these changes ourselves and it's either go through an entire redesign now which can take up to a year or get control of our website back so what I did um was I went out to um a couple of vendor ERS and the prices seemed um a little high to me so I checked in with other Library directors and I also um checked in with um Stan with the head of it for the town and everybody said that the prices that we got were spoton um with it being about $7,000 to get that copy of the website made and then that gets offset because we're no longer paying $4,000 for the other company to make changes for us and that company is now saying we need a redesign because I asked them what it was included in their contract and they came back and said that they wanted to basically do more and I want them to do none so if that makes sense um the companies that gave us estimates one I have is iguana designs another one is Renaissance Web Solutions another one is St Ling um and I've gotten feedback from the other Library directors in lmxac and they all everyone pretty much agrees that the Renaissance company is the one that got the most recommendations from other directors um and they have been checking in with us since I originally proposed this um and got the information in February so I know that they're engaged do you have a list of those of libraries that that use Renaissance so we could look at their websites uh well they're not we don't we're not asking someone to design our website when that comes up I would give you a list and I would give you those proposals the only thing we're asking for right now is um to have them build the copy of our website and then we'll take over and then we'll start the process of redesign so we don't have to rush through that so um with that Aventure then after who's going to manage the website our it manager so the process is let me just clarify this myself and I think for others as well right the process is we need someone to take what we already have as our website and pull it over for us yes and that's what we're paying for so it'll still be the same website which then we'll have control over yes and then our it manager add can go in and start designing his own website and taking full control of it and yes that's essentially it we're not going to make big design changes just organization of resources So currently the company that we pay to design our website manage our website what do we pay them approximately it's 4,000 a year it's 4,000 a year so we would save that 4,000 but we would pay 7,000 it's 8,000 I'm sorry I'm looking 8 we pay 8,000 for someone lift and move it over and do a onetime move two hour and then we would have no cost to them next year or going forward or anyone going forward correct so we would save 4,000 a year so in two years we would make that back and and Adam would continue to manage the website correct okay sounds good does that make sense to everyone yes so are you asking for us to make a motion to go with Renaissance to move this yeah with the 8,000 I wasn't sure what we'd be able to move forward with today okay um but it's something that we'd like to get started it's going to take about a month for the copy to be built um and then uh we'll be able to to go ahead with it so that's what we have okay question question do you do you have quotes from those three people you mentioned yes all right I I would uh like to see those before I would consider voting on them and uh since it's been since February uh I don't know it's uh going to be a hor if we table it till then I think waiting any longer with these makes us look less responsive day by day to the community again is going to be another six months how is it going to be another six months because it's already been six months and when I you know it's been every month put table at table at table at table well if I don't get adequate information uh and uh I haven't had it for six months you have really okay what were the vendors that you have what were the three quotes give us the three three all the vendors in the Iguana is 6500 iguana is an individual person um Renaissance is the 8,000 and then uh Sterling was 7500 and I apologize that's not in front of me but I'm quite certain of that and I went over all of them with a town it manager so what is it exactly because you're saying that they're just going take the website that we have now and kind of move it over they're not adjusting or changing so what's the difference in price that one is so much higher than the other um one is a company that serves a lot of other libraries and one is an in one is an individual who kind of does this on the side the two lower were the people who kind of do it on the side and Renaissance is a larger organization that has a to me a better and more responsive reputation but is there a difference in the way they're moving over or providing anything different I would say expertise and resources yeah that if they run into a problem it's one person trying to figure it out and Renaissance is one who's done um for as an example Renaissance does have a list um Rockville Center Library Springdale Library Cherry Hill Library those are just three of their many the many libraries that they're invol with I would like to see at least three references from each of the vendors uh that can be checked before we go forward where is where is Renaissance located Renaissance is located in Vernon so they're in New Jersey company correct so it's somewhat local yes and and they have um other sites here but that's not what's question I believe I made a motion to table you didn't there's there's no Motion in principle yet Frank so Kevin we would need to see if there's a motion to appoint Renaissance okay do we have a motion to appoint Renaissance to uh move the website no okay well you know what since I've been here I mean this has been the a topic since I I came on board so it's been a while and so why don't we why don't we do it this way right because there is some of the discussion of it's been six months it's going to be six months um I think we lost everybody did we lose everybody yep okay M you got cut off after you said it's been six months no I can you hear me now yes yes no I just said that since I came on board this has been a topic and I'm just wondering you know it's taking a long time to get this website going agreed and I I do think that um updating the website has been one of our priorities for quite some time we've had it on the to-do list um so I you know I'll I'll suggest that we we look to put it on the August um agenda so it there is no further discussion about it so any questions that anyone has or any information that they'd like the request they can request to be sent out uh we'll ask the director to get that out as soon as possible everyone should have the information in a month to uh look at this over and we can come back in August to make a decision anybody else have any feelings on that well I I think the important thing to realize is that this is taxpayer money we're spending I I don't have any problem understanding that we want to improve it but we can't at least I will not support something that I don't have enough physical information in other words you we're told we have Renaissance who an existing company can give us references I haven't heard anything from the director about the two Independents can they Supply us with comparable referen that was all sent to you in March with the invitation to ask any additional questions in every single month since then all my my position simply is that that information should be shared with all of the board members whenever you come at something that's going to be proposed to spend money in that dollar amount however Valar the money amount is uh and as far as a guy at Town Hall uh we were in under the threshold of that our old thing before without talking to him so so so this is what we're going to do I'm going to ask that this get added to the uh August agenda um there's a couple of there's a couple of things that while we're at this topic I'd like to kind of cover off right so you know I I I see that there's a lot of improvements going on which is certainly a positive thing and then there winds up of course being uh a lot of questions as to why do we need to go with this quote or that company and so on and so forth a lot of this stuff needs to be handled within committee um we need to the committee's ability to be track and that these items can be discussed there and vetted there properly before bringing them to to these meetings however we can't allow the Committees to slow down the progress of the library from making the improvements that we've so wanted for so long so whether it be improvements on the you know designs of the library or the you know uh you know the technology of the library or any of that we we have to keep on moving so um I'm going to ask all of the um board members that we we have to like re-engage ourselves and start getting these committees back together um with that I'm going to ask the director as well um I know I know D you have a lot of projects on your mind I know that you have the Google Drive and uh with a lot of updates in there so I'd like to ask that you look at it and come with what you feel are the priorities for the library that you are are looking to start moving forward put them out to the board the board will review them and discuss as a board and make the determination if we want to move forward with these things and if we do we got to send them right away to committee and start getting the Committees more involved in it one one comment that I would um make is I don't know the level of experience that each trustee has with regard to the subject we're talking about or about a thousand different subjects and in many cases I think for the benefit of the public and what we're required to do Under the state bidding laws is is that when somebody comes to me and they're going to tell me I got to buy a new car or something something that I don't have the experience with that's necessarily um and with hopefully that all three members that are on each committee has the expertise to do all these things as opposed to uh director does the research and then comes down to whatever it is three three of those but give us something to read and give us some references and I was posted in March and threshold is one simple number and that is $17,500 anything under that um you can Absol absolutely get as many estimates as you like but that is Bid threshold yes yeah yes and and the fact of the matter is the trustees have and run is by Chris the trustees have the authority to say that we want three bids on anything over $7,000 even though it's 75 of course you would you would get quotes ordinarily at this level which is I believe what you have as far as going out to formal bid for something that's below the bid threshold yeah with a majority of the board you could insist on that I'm not sure why you would but yes you can do that so so with that I'm I'm I'm asking the director to once again send the information to all the board members with the uh with the bids with the quotes um and any of the trustees are free to do their uh own due diligence on that and come back with an opinion next month if they want to move forward or that the Renaissance under uh technology for action on move that under joh one further question um my preference would be or my Prudence would be to see that we have at least three references for each of these quotes certainly okay thank you all right so moving on what's that so bio from the um the companies or what kind of references are we looking for um libraries that they've done similar work for oh there were okay those are usually posted on websites because people post their recommendations so they're not you should be able to find them easily well they don't post bad ones yeah okay so go ahead can we finish with old business kind of squ are we going to get a report on a Financial Consultant uh that's coming up next I I've got that I just wanted to get to okay I just didn't I pass it one one other thing on all business uh D the uh State library has not posted anything from 2020 23 stats for the state the last one uh is of course 2022 I put a call in for Bob uh Keith who is the guy in charge of data down there it was late to late after four o'clock today so hopefully I'll hear from him because one of the one of the in my experience when uh you are working on a budget um whatever the business is you know what you did last year year uh you know what you did two years ago you anticipate where you think your volume is going to go whatever and at least you have a starting point to set that budget uh now I would ask that in support of that process it says that both the board and of course the operating director um should be working collaboratively at least uh toward my point is this without knowing we have we haven't had any reports uh I believe sometime when you started where we get a monthly action of how much circulation we had uh and I don't know when that was ever discussed or approved by the board I think it's a an integral report that you need because if we find that this new budget standing four people or five people and we don't have any more volume then you got to discuss why or what you're gonna do so toward that may I finish please toward that end if I don't hear we don't hear from Bob Keith in the next day or two will follow up and if there's some change that they've made at the state level then we're going to have to you have the report that was sent to him correct the annual report of our numbers yes so if we can't find that I'd be happy to come in and just review it um okay so I'm confused I just want to clarify what you're referring to um so you had said something about budget planning using that for Budget planning yes and that money for the municipal allocation was already determined and reported and that was put in the draft budget that was submitted in December of 2023 is that what you're referring to well how much money is that it's in the budget no that's that's a dollar amount of the funding that we've got correct the municipal allocation for the coming year that has been delivered to libraries and was used in creating the 2024 budget yes do we have a 2024 budget it was submitted to the finance committee in December of 2023 I've requested every month that it be reviewed all due respect I don't think it dies there if they don't respond to it I think the budget is director's responsibility and it's our responsibility to do something with it I'm not going to vote for a bill list till I get a budget to compare the present to what we budgeted for I I it's July one of my questions in the that I have in the director's report for this month is if I may send the draft budget out to the full board since it is already July I I think you need to ask Chris that because I don't understand if a commit I don't understand the function of committees the way I understand it the Committees are to help the board determine what they're going to do all right it doesn't have anything to do the job of organizing the library so if you submit it to the the committee and it doesn't work on it given a reasonable amount of time I think you work around them and you bring it to the rest of us now your problem is the rest of us for the last couple of meetings have been five people so and and and you're exactly right Dr George and that's the point that I was getting to and I think that's where the director is getting with a lot of these items that we've been looking to move forward such as the website so on that there haven't been these committee meetings now there's with good reason for some uh for others a little bit you know uh maybe just unavailable but um we do need to get back into that committee structure and get these things reviewed and and um vetted in the in the Committees so that then the full trustees feel more comfortable when they go to move it forward and on the issue of the committee's function versus the Board function yes and we talked about this with some Personnel items in 2023 if things are not arriving back at on this table out of committee you certainly have the right to introduce them on this on an agenda with notice to all Trustees for discussion and action yep so you can do that with the budget if that's your choice as president that's the frustration that a lot of us have um just to get anything done it seems to be impossible I would like to I have another question why is the fact that we're on YouTube a secret from whom from everybody there's one place where that's announced and that's on our website on the top of the agenda and minutes there's one sentence that says if you were interested in looking at the TV thing press here but I don't see it anywhere else that if you're interested in looking at our meetings we're on YouTube so I I just it's frustrating I can certainly make a point that we'll include that in the newsletter and once we get control of our website then we can get off of YouTube and we can get on to Niche where we should be be a long time at the rate we're going okay you know I mean I'm not I'm not you for it I'm agreeing with the frustration that Maddie has said and and you know I feel uh the business about having consultant for finance that may be me I may be the only one that thinks I'm an absolute idiot on this Finance stuff but I need help so and and I'll get to that once we get into the director's report I have the update on that okay thank you um so the the servers um this is not where we're going with a vendor this is simply a bill for the equipment and the software This Is Us doing the project ourselves for upgrading the servers and in the report um The Domain controllers are about 10 years old and this has been brought up again since March uh having a Windows folder creation date of August 2013 and a bios install date of 2014 um they are malfunctioning I've been reporing this for months um we have the domain controllers that are no longer talking to each other they're doing something called tombstoning we have had the free expertise of the Town it manager in helping us because we are connected to some extent with our data lines coming through the building um the cost of the servers and software those two servers um are $6,000 each and including software um the whole thing would come up to 12,000 in the report I included the specs for anyone um who is well-versed enough to know how to read those specs and you can see um the reason that we're going we don't we have support left over from CX Tech that we already paid for when we did the installation of the Tower so they will be there to help guide us should we have any issues we're not anticipating any and as I said that total cost is 12,000 we are each and every single day at risk of these shutting down they've gone from tombstoning which the um the town it manager was able to help us understand that and now they're at the point where they're no longer booting up and coming on our computers and that's the last sign that we will get if those servers are not upgraded when they go the entire building is down and it's going to be extremely expensive to get us back up that's public computers that's staff computers I understand wanting more information with websites and background I am absolutely begging at this point for us to get these servers moving so I would like to say on the behalf of Stan from the it from the township anything he recommends I'm good with because I know how well he he knows his things yeah so if he's saying it and he's recommending it I personally feel that that alone speak a lote with you this is my point in that we need expert help we need it in law we need it in I need it in finance and we need it in this computer stuff you can read me reports I don't know what you're talking about doing and I'm not going to go out and learn it now give me an expert that knows computers and said we need this and let's stop talking about it and get it done in addition to uh doing it's what $6,000 plus $66,000 and any additional charges or installation or whatever what would that be we are doing the installation when you say we who is we the information technology manager I come in to support and make sure that that's done we have additional support from the town it manager all right so somebody make a motion we'll go forward motion okay do I have a second I'll second okay Frank you do it all right any further discussion all right roll call please Kevin yes Dr George yes I am a yes Zab yes Maddie yes Frank yes thank you okay all right moving on um this is is a bit much sorry um saltwater day um is coming up and sorry this relates to the incident that we had last week at Lawrence Harbor so saltwater day um I went and did it saltwater Day last year putting up a tent doing activities doing those things we really didn't get anybody interested in the library and it was a lot of effort to get out there but we did it um other staff members have tried other things this year we have the branch it is my recommendation that we not open the branch for saltwater day because everybody's coming in to use the bathroom the problem that we had last week which we'll get the bill for next month which was over $2,000 by the time we got done for snaking out the sewer pipe we had to close the branch for two days three days yeah um and the problem is that it's a residential bathroom that's being used as a public facility so it is my recommendation that we not open the library for saltwater day um it's also hard to get staff down there to park we've got to get people to give us exceptions and and that kind of thing so it's my recommendation that saltwater day we not have the presence this year um and we take a look at what we can do next year and see what our circumstances are with the Lawrence Harbor branch and how to approach that D how is how is it's a Township activity it's not a library one so I I think that if you feel that we should shut it down I don't see a problem with that I think you should do it about last week though how come we didn't know that the I had to read it on my computer that the branch was closed two days should we not get some notice about that when it's happening so at any time that we close I don't make that decision until I've checked in with Kevin yeah well I just want to know that was closed I don't want to make the decision but to know to find out that the library is closed and not know about it was on you know just send us a note somehow so I I'll going forward I'll ask or when once we have that discussion to just have someone send a notification out to trustees yeah and and that's that's by board by board some boards have asked me anytime we're closed to send out an email to everyone and I've just been waiting to get that request I have no problem and you know the the problem is is calling me at work she was here uh one morning at 8:30 in the morning to meet the plumber not here at Lawrence haror 8:30 in the morning to meet the plumber and uh there there was other issues going on so she's running around I'm you know I'm at work and you know things yeah it miscommunicated yeah yeah I'll make sure I send it to all trustees anytime we have a closure we had another from the water main break a question for anybody who knows because I only been to saltwater a couple of times um is there any other source um when the when the old wreck building the one that's being replaced now they were able to apparently accommodate uh whatever need were there whether repter parties there or anything of that nature because if you close the library and you don't make some alternate recommendation and who pays for salt water day the Town Township Township the library all that you don't have to worry about that that's not on our that's not our responsibility all right so if we we had so much use of the personal bathrooms that we Clogg the pipe uh and and that source is going to be taken away for whatever it is uh we should at least notify the township and tell them that we're not going to be able to provide that because we're closing well well we weren't open in years we so we didn't have that branch in years past right we we we just using Rec sentor correct which par and Rex has available with a bathroom in there so there's no difference between this year and last year just that the library doesn't have a presence there yes and the other problem you you you have is that people coming to Salt W day are not from what I hear predominantly overd people they're from all over so I don't know why it's the libraries responsibility I'm sure that's who's ever planning salt weather day thinks about bathrooms so typically what day a week is that is Saturday and typically we're open on a Saturday yes so we'll just make sure that there's a notice posted ahead of time the branch will be closed that day yes and and uh the librarian can come to work here or take a day off yeah okay okay um and that I apologize I was getting that confused with um the last thing that I had on new business was um a request um as we did last year we closed library for staff Training Day um we did it on a Friday near the holidays when people can might expect it a little bit more and this fulfills our requirement um for state for training that's when we get those hours in for the year so we would like to um do that and have the library closed on Friday December 20th for our annual training day I think in the past that Maria would know I think it's traditionally been around that time that we had a full day staff um so and and so we did it last year I know and we did it on a Friday we did and Friday is not very I mean like traffic wise is not as busy as some of the other days maybe yeah Friday's less busy than our other days okay and we didn't get much push back I mean I'm sure there was a few people that none none okay no honestly we had no push back from um the community last year we had one comment that our signage wasn't clear enough so make sure that that's um taken care of okay and I'll provide an agenda at minimum a month before probably two months before so that the board can review the agenda for training day okay I don't believe this is an Chris I thought doing this okay so then someone to make a motion can you lump them together for what the two dates want to close Lawrence haror and this one do you need to do Lawrence Hara you don't need to do the Lawrence Hara one this one this was a different one because you're talking about a staff training day and closing you're basically changing the library calendar on this one I need a motion and D I don't know if this is out of turn because you have you haven't given the report yet but uh I did read that the uh expenses are running higher on repairing bathroom number seven and that's got to be revised and and if if it's all right I'm going to get to that in the director's report okay fine that's fine I'll wait sure all right so uh are we making you make the motion I'll make a motion we have a motion out there do we have a second this is to second okay what motion the motion is Friday Library Friday December 20th for staff training oh well second and when that me when that thing gets posted as well please uh include in it that people can electronically assuming that our servers are taken care of before then uh can uh access whatever they can electronically okay all right um did you get that y he just said just make sure that when we post the closure that we put a statement that people can uh access our services electronic oh of course yeah yeah okay so any other discussion on this Dr George oh sorry yes yes thank you I am a yes Zab yes Maddie yes Frank yes Kevin yes we're good okay thank you now where where were we at there's one other thing I wanted to uh mention I saw the advertisement for the uh artist that's going to be here tomorrow I mean mean Saturday sing your 30s to 60s music songs um and question for Chris if we wanted to every time we we we recorded them even the high school kids recorded them they could also be used as something if they can be used as something to sell the process of what goes on so people know uh if they see some of the groups that have been here in the past and going forward I think it just might be a help uh to get more more music and more entertainment out to people yeah and as long as you're not using it for a commercial benefit of the library if you're just maintaining it as an activity that has happened you can do that right okay all right does anybody have anything else for new business okay we will move on to director's report so to get started um with that that uh Lawrence Harbor with that bathroom so the issue there isn't the amount of volume that the bathroom is being used it has to do with you if you have an understanding of Plumbing most old cast iron pipe has gets replaced with PVC roots and things get into the cast iron so at some point the PVC was was put in but underneath the building is still the cast iron so where the cast iron connects up into the PVC the pipe has settled so that there's a lip of about two inches that blocks waste from moving through so the reason why this was so complicated and got so expensive was because the water moves through but the rest of the things do not move through so this is why it had to be clean out in a special way and why I in fact asked um Chris to assist us in determining as things got more expensive I put a halt on it to um make sure that it was still our responsibility because if you have um bathrooms that get clogged getting those cleaned is obviously the tenants responsibility but as you get into sewer pipes to me that becomes more of a structural issue so I wanted to check and make sure that it was within our maintenance it was determined that it was we went through with the rest of that now um that um Archer Plumbing has gone through and fully examined that pipe and found that the pipe itself needs to we need to be very careful with how we're using that and they recommend that that pipe be fixed and I don't believe that that's a tenant responsibility that's correct that that's a structural change and with that written recommendation that should be shared with Amboy and B to them as landlord yes and so I'm going to be sending this to them but it's $14,500 and the floor would have to be demoed so I don't see that happening but I wanted to let all of you know before I send that on to Amboy because I I mean I don't see it as a request to Amboy but it is letting them know what was found out and then if we continue to have problems then it becomes an issue but hopefully we don't joh yeah D um offline I'll give you the phone number uh for the obmua not that they're going to fix it but you can get a a free second opinion uh and I'm sure you'll get response from them they they may give you some glad that might be helpful less expensive that sounds like an excellent suggestion thank you um okay um to get on to where we're at my apologies as I rifle through this is a special report this is not it sorry I'm getting to the finance portion um so what I did as requested is I went through and did a survey of all of the lmxac library directors um about funding about finance and of the 40 responded um and so I took the opportunity to ask a number of questions um the majority of libraries um when it came so I asked them very specifically um what the if the director had a role in finance rates um and determining where where banking which bank was being used um in the majority six libraries the treasur and the board made the banking decisions the direct Library director had only one of those 13 libraries had the director alone evaluating rates some had their Finance person some had a combination of Library administrators so it wasn't auditors um of the 11 and I just looked at the 11 libraries in 11 of them the director doesn't even sign checks so that was where that was um I gave the results of the survey and the report in addition to that what I've what I've done because I was originally looking at the um Municipal deposit banks which the state puts out a list of those every year and I went down through those and I start started checking in on rates and then I realized that I need to scrap that so I'll have that list next month um because it actually has to also be a bank that Irene can get to so it can't be any Bank in the state um that I was going from that list it's got to be someplace where she can go and make actual um deposits and things like that so that will be coming um and that's the result of the research that I have thus far okay okay um what's going to be coming next month and I spoke to Chris very briefly about it is going to be a draft of some changes to the notary policy we've had some concerns and issues from municipal offices in the town because we advertise we have regular notary services but we don't do full notary services there's a lot that we don't do such as trusts and wills and and things like that so what happens is that the public gets frustrated um some of our Municipal agencies get frustrated because they're wondering why we're not signing things so what I want to do and I'll just make recommendations once um that committee is back in order um to just make a suggestion that we change things to say say limited notary policy and list what we actually do like saying that we do the the school forms is a big help to the community that we get those done some of the sports things that we get done some of the services that we do with notarizing um passport forms that's a big help to the community so there is a lot of worth in what we do but I think making it clear via our policy is going to take a lot of frustration out for the public and for staff so that's coming um budget um I'm very excited we have the driver um getting ready that situation to um get that going again in September with visits to the preschools and to the Senior Communities we had our um new head of Adult Services and the IT manager went to planfield today planfield is a state model and leader in digital literacy instruction and they went in today so that in September we're going to be able to start adding back some classes some of the onetoone sessions and things like that so basically the a lot of things the board's been asking for are all um moving forward um lastly the transition with the catalog has still not been good I am very much um on top of that with LMX that is now called Stella there's a lot of discussion going on with um the way that the new catalog is and uh what we could do to make improvements there um we are also I'm not sure anyone remembers couple of months ago I had said that I wanted to purchase um Plymouth rocket Plymouth rocket is a software that's about $1500 a year that would be for room reservation um calendar and uh room reservation calendar calendar and event registration because right now we don't have any Central management system for all of our rooms and that's a big problem our calendar you can't even see it on a mobile device you can only see it on a regular computer I'm exploring what's available for free in our new catalog that'll be happening in August but I don't want anybody to think that that fell off the table all right um and then lastly I want to make sure um as we're still getting in with purchasing um with I'm not entirely understanding we purchased those um early literacy stations a few months ago and they're very popular we have so many parents using them and enjoying them the two that we're going to be putting out for older students I need to purchase a table and chairs um but I don't I'm a little hesitant to purchase a table and chairs because even though it's within the director's discretion I don't want that to end up being a problem later on so that's just a general question about being able to purchase especially when I keep a close eye on our um Furnishings budget for the year and there's $142,000 left in it for this year yeah if it's within your discretion and it's within your current available funds under your current budget okay then it's fine there is no requirement go in your director's report probably but there's no requirement for action or specific approval I I just want to be clear so that we can start uh sailing a bit more smoothly all right uh Chris uh or danan can you uh tell everybody for any of the new newer trustees what that threshold is that uh D has discretion to go forward assuming that the funding is there what your I think it's it's it's 2600 um so that's the rule that I've had here in other libraries I'm just sharing this for experience it's been much more about bid threshold and the budget if we have a category for furniture that is $142,000 and I have an expense that's less than 175 than those of course it goes in the director's report and it gets discussed I've never worked anywhere where each of those had to be voted on if that's the board's wish then that's fine um and the threshold that I got was $2,600 that that was a purchase that could be made without putting all of the the rationale in and a big discussion that those were that's what that was yeah so Chris the the furniture I assume is going to be under 2600 of course all right so it's within your discretion the funds are there case closed yeah y okay I I think that when it's something that's obviously Library business and you're recommending that it's used and we need more of them there's no question that you should be able to order it but you keep saying if it's in the budget or it's in the budget we don't have a budget so that's what could you just do something to get us the budget budget's already done it'll be sent out uh then put it on the October the August agenda and if the finance committee wants to come fine and if they don't we vote on it anyway is that what I would what I would recommend for the budget is that you send it one last time to the committee and say it's discussed in the full meeting this will be voted on the August agenda unless the committee has you know any any uh discussion that they want to bring so you you want me to send it out to the finance committee I'd like to S finance committee right and then we know that when you send out the packet for August meeting it'll be included in it okay but you're going to give a heads up to the committee that this is going forward unless they want to take action within the next 30 days understood and I have nothing else okay okay um for new business or or actually we covered all old business new business all right moving on the committee reports buildings and grounds Roco is not here have you guys had a meeting no no nothing okay Finance we discussed Outreach and marketing Frank I know there's nothing going on there no uh person now negotiations Sarah is not here but we have not had a meeting yeah and we'll be starting negotiations after your September meeting September you said yeah yep and policy I think you covered policy already notary yeah the notary policy can I yes can I can I say one thing with um regard just and this is just a general question for the board so before we got started so some of you may not have seen it I have a draft of the newsletter um that we're going to be Printing and doing starting off at the about 200 print copies to see how that works and then we're also going to be using Constant Contact and cleaning that up where we have about 15,000 um contacts there but the last time the newsletter was sent out there were about 5,000 uh people who opened it so we're going to be cleaning that up and that's all um in that position so we'll be reporting back but is everyone okay with moving forward with us doing 200 print copies and then using electronically are there any further recommendations I understand putting the YouTube that the meetings are in we'd like to include that somewhere um and we're we're stressing what I came up with as a draft and that is visit borrow stream so that's the little tagline V visit as in visit the library borrow as in borrow from the library and stream meaning we're a 247 Library where you access where you gonna put the printed copies I think Maddie asked that I was interested in that too or are the printed copies only going to be at the library um it it's that's what our what our plan was to start if the board would prefer that we leave them somewhere else we can do that I I think that we keep preaching to the same choire if we do all our surveys and we talk to people who come to the library and then we do things and we put it in the library a lot of people at the internet never come to the library but are interested you know in these things so if it be possible put it on the website of course my apologies it will also be available on the website and and and if you can post uh you know we could start using our social media more and post links to it we have you know so and then um you know maybe so you can have our marketing person now speak to the township and find out what sources they find available for uh when they put out things like that such as all around Oldbridge I know they mail it to everyone but I also know that it's available in certain locations around the township how about the new shop right everybody's going there yeah Target shop right and you got a high volume of traffic and I'm sorry go ahead just that was my question is 200 print copies to conservative should I be doing more and leaving I mean should we do 400 and 200 we leave at other locations I'm I'm genuinely asking for your opinion on starting depends you know I mean nobody can give you an exact answer so yeah and I think it depends on how many locations you find that you can put it out at right okay yeah yeah I mean this is going to be an an experiment at first it's been two years but could I also ask that the newsletter I I don't I don't read it so I don't there may be something in there is there something that highlights let's say every month uh a service that's available at the library yes there is sorry so what what what we do and what we've been doing sorry I'm so excited that we're finally getting to this so every month we highlight a service every month we highlight a youth program um an adult program an author and we make sure that we're hitting our Electronic Services as much as we're doing our print and this is where um just as an as an example we have a whole um I'll just I'll just I'll I'll send you all the draft before we start printing um but it says the library as your travel center and on that page we have passport Services we have pronunciator which is our database for language learning for when you're going to travel and then for the kids we have uh playaway launchpads which are little learning devices that they can borrow and take with them so it's it's where you can get your books about travel your language learning entertainment for the kids and all of that and that's the kind that's just one page as an example um so you could you could drop them off at places like the YMCA with his families that go the YMCA local banks some place where they're waiting online and go grab it yep while they're waiting online the township also you can do it right by the um courtroom because it's always packed over there so okay I put all my stuff out there too I didn't know table and um I even have a Bolton board there I could always pin one in there for but you can leave hard copies for people to pick up and we're doing one of the news letters that we've shared in the past is Highland Parks it's Mike babish's library with us and it's it's very good and there's a section in it that I thought was clever it has the telephone numbers that you need for Elder Care for things that you would be getting from the municipal building but these are telephone numbers that you can get at the library okay okay just a lot of resources that are out of the library but or in oldridge but look at it you'll see you know they're good ideas I appreciate that um and also another section that's going to be in is Library by the numbers to start giving um some value calculations every month um meaning exactly what Frank was talking about with the number of circulations the number of books that people have access to passports issued how many people are volunteering we're just going to be doing that um as an aside the new catalog has um on every receipt that's printed whether we want it or not it tells you how much money you're saving by checking out these books from the library meaning if you checked out three books you're saving $84 I'm not a huge fan we weren't asked about it yeah well that's okay there's one other favorite project I had that I would like to see maybe enter into it and that's notable old brid people people who went to Oldbridge schools who have got Fame in the world and no felons there are more than you ever want to know and it just highlight one every once in a while and there ought to be a list because we started a whole big list and and not even and in addition to that Richard ferelli from the Historical Society um I've am having our uh off-site Services the branch manager reach out to him because their videos are still on YouTube and I was actually fascinated some of the people that were featured in those with the Oldbridge history and who was featured in The New York Times about Oldbridge and things like that and we're looking at that being something so the Lawrence Harbor branch has less history um available to it than the rest of Oldbridge so we're actually looking at finding a way way for that Lawrence Harbor history for her to take a lead with that because I think that's something that's really going to engage the residents there um and and start moving in with that there's a a wonderful book and it's the headquarters of Cheesequake Creek that's the history book and we're so fortunate to have a history that detailed most towns don't get that they get those books where it's all old pictures and not much information we've got a really rich history book written that was put out and is still managed by the Historical Society you could do electronic backpack in the schools yeah with your electronic copy and that'll reach all the schools especially all the parents in elementary schools yeah because they're the ones that look at okay um just a little couple couple Rock I don't know if that's anywhere I didn't hear you broke up oh yeah I said we also had a big rock and roll history I don't know if that's anywhere oh I'm I'm gonna I'm gonna put that on there what's that history I think it's like Metallica circle on my I think so I didn't even know that you speak you speak to the Oldbridge militia about that okay used to stay at the house on English Town Road wow yeah okay be million people claiming they went to school with them to their kids so they won't think their parents are so old um one of one of the other things is I think needs to be done and I've you know talked about it for a number of years correct me if I'm wrong joh but our record our numbers of membership only a five digigit zip code is that correct oh Frank you hit the nail on the head I've been dying to tell you the new catalog system extends to that additional four-digit code so the the what they've said is that once the catalog gets going and we start getting reports we are now going to be able to refine our circulation statistics to specific neighborhoods within Oldbridge all right so you'll be a you will be able to do this all at once rather than as rather than to do it you know member by member that kind of thing because the uh the thing particularly if you're looking to justify it's putting a lot of money into South alge which I think we are um but I want to confirm it too and if you get those when you get the nine digigit zip codes you should be able toy by W recognize how many because quite Pro the big problem with it is we all know traffic is not getting better it's getting worse and kids who go to grammar school or anything like that uh and if a parent wants to take them after school by the time they get off a bus at close to four o'clock it's virtually impossible so um that can be a lot of support you know yeah once they work out these Kinks with the catalog right now it's doing Auto renews without and we didn't ask for that we don't want Auto renews and we're having a really hard time getting that fixed so I'm being quite vocal um on the director's list from lmxac with pushing for all the benefits that we're supposed to get but that's one of them that I will will absolutely focus on because I've taken to heart all the the times that you've um expressed how important it is yeah and and of course lmxac was the one who recommended that we do away with fines but uh you weren't here then and the whole nation is recommending getting rid of fines I've never brought that up here but that's a national Trend not a Consortium Trend well when when the proposal was brought down to us uh at the time I suggested to the director who had gone to the lmxac meeting was the next person you'll hear from is our attorney and we never went to it some of some of our County other libraries went to it and it was a disaster and they got out of it quickly it's a national Trend because it's actually working out in a lot of areas but that's not I think we've got a lot more projects to get through before that comes up absolutely okay um there was something else but I've uh oh I know have any of you ever gone on to the New Jersey site and checked a list of any of the databases that they have access to um which I would suggest just to otherwise they have an extensive very comprehensive explanation of the brain freeze uh program which is which is very helpful if somebody's interested in it uh so since I'm going to be housebound for several more weeks or maybe a month uh I'm sure I'll be having conversations with you about things that I think there that you might be interested in that would make sense for you to decide if you want to use them or not do if you mean the the databases that are available on the State website those are already integrated into our website but they are very useful okay all right that's all I've got thank you one last thing I would uh just like to note um I think it was probably around the end of the year last year we were discussing the emails and so on and and making sure that uh we all had a orridge library email set up and I know that don't made sure that all of us got one set up I believe everybody did right all trustees should have one um just to better protect ourselves in case there's any uh concerns of anything discussions wise or anything um we all should be you using the Old Bridge Library emails for Library business so I just encourage everyone to start using it so that the director can start to drop off our personal emails from the communications and and I just want to add that things like like that um technology report those I post them on under the board reports so there those are there um I always Post in there and I have been sending when I do an email I send it to everyone's personal and Oldbridge so that we can get used to everything so I'll wait for you to tell me when to stop sending them the other way if if anyone is using it and would like do to drop the their personal just please send her an email or'll give her a call definitely a good idea to move towards Library emails and away from personal emails yeah all right with that I will move on to public comments if the anybody from the public has anything nothing from the public okay then with that I will ask for did you have something um you didn't do the motion for the executive session minutes yeah com we combin com okay I com so with that I'll ask for a motion to adjourn I'll make it thank you second I second thank you all in favor I all right no thank you good night thank you good night everyone good night