The Texas State Library and Archives Commission has proposed new administrative rules governing TexShare membership, and they are posted in the Texas Register for a thirty-day comment period. To review the rules, please see the Texas Register at http://www.sos.state.tx.us/texreg/sos/PROPOSED/13.CULTURAL%20RESOURCES.html#171. Please send your official comments to me by mail, email, or FAX at my contact information below. We are especially interested in your thoughts about whether TexShare membership should continue to be limited to nonprofit institutions or whether for-profit organizations should be allowed to apply for membership.

At the Statewide Resource Sharing Summit held on February 28, 2008, summit attendees recommended a change in the statutes governing TexShare in order to give the TexShare membership more control over the composition of TexShare membership. Potential benefits of an expanded membership, including benefits of allowing for-profit organizations to join TexShare, were discussed. The report from the resource sharing summit can be found at http://www.texshare.edu/memberinfo/advisoryboard/strategic_2008final.html

In response to the recommendations of the summit, the law governing TexShare was changed so that any future TexShare expansion would be governed by administrative rule. We are now proposing the rules to govern future TexShare expansion.

The proposed rules reflect the following principles:
In order to be a TexShare member, a library should
Be credentialed, accredited, or able to show evidence that it has adequate resources to be a contributing member of the consortium
Be part of a defined group of libraries that have common interests
Have gone through a period of affiliate status
Have an adequate, sustainable source of funding its participation
Be willing to participate beyond the database program
Through its participation, enhance services to consortium members

The full set of principles that provided background for the rules are located at http://www.texshare.edu/memberinfo/advisoryboard/ruleprinciplesrevised.2009-09-25.doc.

The proposed rules were discussed and approved for posting at the TexShare Advisory Board meeting on September 21, 2009 and at the Texas State Library and Archives Commission meeting on October 12, 2009. Both the advisory board and the commission engaged in lengthy discussion of the question of potential membership for for-profit institutions. The board and the commission have decided to post these rules, which limit expansion to nonprofit organizations, but to ask for comments regarding the question of allowing for profit institutions to apply for membership before making a final decision.

If you have any questions about the rules or the process of developing the rules, don't hesitate to contact me.

Please send comments on the rules to:

Beverley Shirley, Division Director
Library Resource Sharing
Texas State Library and Archives Commission
PO Box 12927
Austin, Texas 78711
(512) 463-5433 FAX (512) 936-2306
bshirley@tsl.state.tx.us