Present: Barbara Green, Gail Landy, Richard Mays, Nick Noyes, Cathie Talbert, Nancy Woodward (Alternate) and Kate Thomas (Director)
Nick called the meeting to order at 6:02 pm.
We signed the manifest and approved the minutes of December 1, 2014.
Kate, Richard and Cathie described how Kate’s annual review had gone. Before her evaluation Richard had spent many hours compiling the responses from the various forms that the trustees had used to write up their comments. We need to develop and use our own evaluation form in preparing for next year’s review. This will be on the agenda for later this spring. With the Trustees’ agreement Nick will send the Selectmen a letter recommending that, effective January 5, 2015, Kate receive a pay raise.
We discussed the need for shampooing the carpets and for the library, upon occasion, to be more thoroughly cleaned than can be done on a weekly basis. Richard suggested something like a spring and fall special cleaning.
The garden statues are deteriorating. Apparently they can not tolerate our Fitzwilliam winters. Richard has brought them inside and will do some restoration work. We discussed an alternative location for them, perhaps inside, where winter weather won’t be an issue.
After reviewing many proposals we decided the solution presented by Al Johnson & Sons for repair of the small roof over the DVD collection made the most sense. We will proceed with the details that surround the signing of a contract. Nick will go to the Fitzwilliam Historic District Commission on January 8th with a sample of the PVC material that Al Johnson will use in the repairs.
We approved the Long Range Planning Committee’s survey which will appear in the February issue of The Fitzwilliam Newsletter. Every town resident completing the survey will be entered into a drawing for a gift certificate at Market Basket.
The Town auditors will be in town January 18 – 20 and Richard and Barbara are getting our financial statements organized.
We discussed if there was a necessity for Conflict of Interest Statements being required of the Trustees and Director. Gail is going to check with the NHLTA to see what is done in other libraries in the state.
Kate gave a her report: circulation was up for the previous month and for the year 2014 it was up 14% over 2013.
The elevator is not working again. The computers have been updated with “Deepfreeze” and by the front door a People Counter, courtesy of The Friends, has been installed.
Lego Club will start back up in mid-January and Kate is offering a program on The 24-Hour Library on January 26. Reading to Dogs continues on Saturday mornings.
Helping Hand in Troy was most grateful for the gift of books.
We adjourned at 6:58 pm.
Respectfully submitted,
Cathie Talbert