TexShare Card

• Reporting for Jay Clark, TexShare Card Working Group Liaison, TexShare Advisory Board Chair Robert Seal said:
• The Card Working Group is pleased in the amount of increased activity in the card program. The loss rate for material circulated in the TexShare Card program is low.
• There have been inconsistencies from institution to institution in establishing card expiration dates. The group will discuss this issue at its meeting at the Texas Library Association Annual Meeting (TLA).

Discussion:

Large universities have lost revenues previously generated by charging for loans outside their institution. The Card Working Group will be discussing this issue.

TExpress Courier Service

Jo Anne Hawkins reported:

• There are 95 participant with 93 stops for the courier service.
• Spot checks on the new courier, Marquis Messenger, show all is going well.
• Amigos sent out invoices for the TExpress service on February 8, 1999.
• Statistics for the service are becoming more reliable. But some libraries have yet to report their statistics, and some still need to sign participation agreements. A list is being compiled so staff can contact these libraries.
• Nancy Paine will be presenting a testimonial about the courier service at the TexShare program at TLA.
• The Working Group met on February 18, 1999. The group supported several recommendations for addressing and packaging shipments. They also recommended an enhanced Web presence for the TexShare Card service.

Discussion:

Bonnie Juergens said for the courier to track statistics would have increased the cost of the service, but they are asking the courier to do a sample set of statistics in the fall and in the spring of each year. Dr. Martin pointed out the value of tracking the data over time to show the impact of the service in terms of cost avoidance and quicker delivery time.

Jo Anne Hawkins and Bonnie Juergens reported that they are discussing with the courier the issue of including Sul Ross State University in Alpine. All other libraries that have asked to participate are being served.

Bonnie Juergens said Amigos will offer courier service to Amigos libraries that are not TexShare members. TexShare members will be able to use this service to send materials to non-TexShare libraries. The TexShare service will remain intact, and there will be no additional cost for TexShare members.

Education

Bonnie Juergens reported:

• The working group met in Dallas in early December and met subsequently via telephone in Internet.
• They sent and tallied surveys on what training programs were needed. In order to get an adequate response, they did two levels of survey. There appears to be interest in training on OVID databases, copyright and the Web, copyright and reserves, electronic journals, and Ariel training.
• The working group will be discussing the guidelines about the types of training topics that are appropriate for TexShare spending, many of the suggested topics do not directly relate to TexShare services.

Electronic Information

Sue Phillips reported:

• There was a message on the TexShare list regarding problems with the last release of OVID software. In response to the post, Sue received two messages supporting the interface and one indicating the interface was not intuitive. There appears to be no broad base of discontent with OVID.
• An additional $55,000 in TexShare funding will be spent to partially subsidize databases that were identified as popular on a survey from last spring (MLA, Books in Print, CINAHL, and the Ovid Nursing Collection). Sue said the amounts are not dependent on the number of libraries and that there was a substantial saving over prices being quoted for individual libraries. This a new way for TexShare to offer databases. For these database choices, TexShare pays the entry fee in return for the vendor providing a discounted institutional cost. This is also TexShare's first entry into electronic journals collections.
• A survey on databases will be sent out to each TexShare library director.
• Free databases, such as AGRICOLA will be included on the TexShare database menu.

Discussion:

Mark McFarland said the new TexShare server began service on March 22, after a testing period. The old URL will point to the new server address. TexShare will expand to accommodate 180 simultaneous users in late March. This should reduce turn-aways. Mark said the new server can grow to accommodate new TexShare database offerings.

With regards to the frustration of reference librarians using the OVID search engine, there was a comment the problem may not have been product as much as the communication process surrounding the most recent release. Possible solutions mentioned included forming an electronic discussion list for reference librarians in Texas or promoting the use of the TexShare list as an avenue of communication.

Interlibrary Loan

Bonnie Juergens reported for Sara Lowman:

• The Interlibrary Loan Working Group wants to work with the TExpress Working Group on communicating standard procedures for return of items.
• Since the changes to protocol that the working group proposes are cosmetic, they do not need to be approved by the Advisory Board. But they need to be communicated to membership.
• The group's Ariel report will be posted to the Web site.
• Tim Prather and Rebecca Linton are putting together a survey on lending nontraditional materials such as videos and compact disks. Dr. Martin encouraged the group to start looking at including rare books in an interlibrary lending program.
• The group is preparing an ILL workshop to be held in Dallas in November.
• The group wants to find ways to fund cross visits between ILL staffs. Funds would need to include travel money and arrangements for the ILL staffs to have time off from their home institutions.

Texas Collections

Kathy Hoffman reported:

• TexTreasures grant application packets went out on Friday. Completed proposals are due in early May. A total of $100,000 is available, and the grants will be approved at the July State Library and Archives Commission meeting.
• In the future the Library Resource Sharing Commission will try to get the grant applications out further in advance of the deadline.

• After initial notifications of tier assignments had gone out, it was pointed out that assignments were to be based upon full time equivalents (FTEs) rather than upon head counts. Assignments were recalculated, based on FTEs, and libraries for which there was a change due to the revised procedures were notified.
• The Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board does not provide FTE counts for independent institutions. Norman Hood of the Independent Colleges and Universities of Texas will provide these to the State Library. Sue Phillips will also receive the FTE counts, as vendors ask for these when determining database licensing fees.

Discussion:

Dr. Martin clarified that the Texas State Library and Archives Commission (TSLAC) does not determine what is an institution of higher education nor what these institution's enrollment counts are. It gets data from the official source of that data. TSLAC has been questioned as why a wide variety of sizes can appear in same tier. The Board may review the TexShare tier structure at some point in the future.

Michael Piper reported:

• Deborah Littrell will start as the State Library‰s TexShare Coordinator on April 1, 1999.
• The Library Resource Sharing (LRS) Technical Support Specialist position has been offered, and the candidate will announce a decision on Tuesday, March 23, 1999.

The Legislative Budget Board recommended no additional funding for TexShare in FY2000. After reviewing the State Library's funding request, the House added $1 million and no FTE for TexShare, while the Senate proposed adding $2 million and three FTE. These proposals will be worked out in a conference committee during the middle of April. It any of the additional FTEs are funded, they would go to the State Library‰s Library Resource Sharing Division (LRS) to provide support for TexShare.

Planning for possible integration of public libraries into TexShare

Dr. Martin reported on House Bill 1433, which would include public libraries in TexShare. He said some constituents are concerned about TexShare governance, as HB 1433 only specifies two representatives from public libraries on the TexShare Advisory Board. The Texas Library Association is calling a meeting to resolve the issue.

Joe McCord said the original concept for TexShare included public and academic libraries. It has taken some time to reach the point where public libraries may be included in TexShare. The Advisory Board reaffirmed its commitment to working with the public library community. Any changes in TexShare will be carefully planned and implemented gradually.

Items that will need to be addressed include:

• Organization of the Library Resource Sharing Division. Working groups will continue to play a strong role in defining TexShare programs. In close collaboration with TexShare stake holders, LRS staff designs and implements these programs.
• Overlaps in licensing of similar products for the public and academic libraries will be scrutinized to achieve economies of scale and savings.
• Governance: While the working group structure will remain intact, it may have a different composition and structure. Public libraries need strong representation on these groups. Public libraries can be reassured that the Advisory Board operates more on consensus than on majority vote and that the Library Commission promulgates final policy.

Clarification is needed on roles and responsibilities of the Advisory Board, TexShare subcontractors, and the State Library. Working from a draft written by Robert Seal, TexShare Advisory Board Chair, Dr. Martin will circulate a document outlining how these organizations can coordinate their activities most effectively. Dr. Martin will distribute the document to the Advisory Board within two weeks.

The Board's summer meeting will be July 9, 1999 in Austin. Meeting details will follow. The fall meeting will be November 15, 1999 in Dallas at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center Conference Room.

Advisory Board: Marty Adamson (UT Southwestern Medical Center), Paul E. Dumont (Dallas Community College District), George Huffman (Amarillo College), T. Grant Jones, S. Joe McCord (University of Houston-Clear Lake), Gilda Baeza Ortego (Sul Ross State University), Robert A. Seal (Texas Christian University)

Coordinating Council: Jay Clark (San Jacinto College), David Gill (Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board), Jo Anne Hawkins (University of Texas at Austin), Kathryn Hoffman (University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Research Medical Library), Bonnie Juergens, Amigos, Mark McFarland (University of Texas at Austin), Sue Phillips (University of Texas at Austin)

Texas State Library and Archives Commission: Robert Martin, Michael Piper

Visitors: Norman Hood (Independent Colleges and Universities of Texas)

Recorder: Beverley Shirley (Texas State Library and Archives Commission)