University Library Council
October 10, 2006
10:00 – 11:30 a.m.
Dean’s Conference Room
MEETING MINUTES
Present: Klumpp (chair), Baeder, Baughman, Dix, Greer, Francescato, Lowry, Modi, Newhagen, Peres, Ruschoff.
Absent: Foudy, Lapin, Finsterbusch
Guest: Provost William Destler
Call to order: 10:15 a.m.
Topic: Welcome and Introduction
Klumpp welcomed new members and all members introduced themselves.
Topic: Minutes of September 11, 2006
The minutes were approved without amendment.
Topic: Reports
- Chair’s Report. Klumpp reported that over the summer, the Senate Executive Committee had approved the idea of a task force to look at changes in the distribution of scholarly productivity, including changes in the economics of publishing, as well as new formats (electronic publishing, for example). The aim is to provide a descriptive statement of changes to provide a broad overview for the whole institution to see. Klumpp is helping the Committee draw up the charge.
- Comments, questions, kudos from Council members. Klumpp explained to new members the concept of opening up the agenda for members to bring up issues or questions for discussion immediately or at later sessions. There were no items at this time.
- Dean’s Report. Lowry said he is working with Johns Hopkins University Library to free up storage space by eliminating print runs of commonly held JSTOR journals and utilizing the JHU print holdings as a shared collection and archival back up.
Topic: Libraries Acquisitions Budget
The current budget
Provost William Destler met with the Council to discuss the budget. He began by distributing a chart showing the budget provided to the libraries over the years of his tenure as provost. He pointed out that his original plan was to keep the Libraries in step with inflation, but this plan was interrupted in 2004 when the state sharply reduced its contribution to the University and mandated further cuts in addition. Since then, he has tried to increase the libraries’ budget steadily. He pointed out that the state barely acknowledges inflation and does not include the libraries in any calculations of inflation, when it prepares its budget for the University. The Provost’s office does not take from the libraries to give to athletics, as implied in the Diamondback.
Klumpp explained that the Libraries’ budget could be separated into salaries, other non-acquisition expenses, and acquisitions. The current problem is in the acquisitions portion. Furthermore, the problem is not a cut in the budget. The problem is that the Provost’s increase for acquisitions in FY2007 is $300,000, the amount needed to keep pace with actual costs is about $900,000, leaving a shortfall of $600,000.
Destler said this was the pent-up fallout from the big hit the budgets took in 2004, when his plan to inject an annual $300,000 to the Libraries to keep pace with inflation was stopped.
Lowry commented that in public institutions, salaries are always legislated, but acquisitions never are, so the money has to come from somewhere else. The inflation rate for purchasing materials has been 8-10% during the past few years, well in excess of the CPI.
Destler pointed out that he has very little flexibility in the amount of money he has available to provide to the libraries.
ARL comparisons
Greer praised the services the library is providing, especially the electronic resources and ILL, but is disturbed by the numbers in comparison with peer institutions.
Destler said that the University is less well funded than the institutions we are compared to. For example, we have $2,500 less per student than U North Carolina. He said that the instructional appropriation is half from the state, half from tuition. The University has to educate state government in the value and importance of higher education.
Lowry asked if the libraries’ inflation could be considered similarly to that of other services such as utilities. Destler responded that he was not sure if the University could get the state to acknowledge inflation in library costs, when it barely acknowledges higher utility costs. He said he had asked Lowry to calculate what it would cost to raise our position in the ARL rankings to 30th over a period of years. He foresees that everything out of copyright would be available on the Web in 25 years’ time, so attention should turn to the library of the future. He complimented Lowry on his efforts so far, in that the UM Libraries are seen as a progressive institution, even though the collections don’t match up.
Lowry noted that the ARL statistics are originally intended to identify libraries for membership in ARL, not to measure how well a library delivers services. Also, the rankings between us and the top position include a lot of very wealthy, private institutions.
Overhead
Greer wondered if some of the overhead from grants could be tied to library enhancement.
Destler responded that the indirect cost budget is around $50 million. Half is taken by the state as a credit against what they owe the University. The other half is divided into DRIF and facilities, and the libraries get a little of that, such as the current HVAC enhancement work in Hornbake.
ULC action
Klumpp suggested forwarding a motion to the Senate in favor of a current services model for the libraries, that is, funding the next year to maintain the level of service delivered this year.
Destler said that would mean taking money from other units to support such a model. Destler felt the frustration of rapidly rising publication costs, which are not tied to the cost of production but reflect other factors. Extortion seemed to be a part of the rise.
Lowry said there was also a huge increase in ILL costs – what the collections do not have, we obtain by borrowing. Newhagen commented that seemed like a false economy, to borrow at a cost instead of buying. Lowry said that frequency of borrowing was tracked and if a publication was often requested, by many borrowers, the Libraries would consider purchasing it.
Klumpp thanked Destler for meeting with the Council.
Topic: Action on Budget
The Council then discussed the draft motion drawn up by Klumpp to respond to the budgetary crisis.
Discussion of statements:
- Councilors wanted to see actual numbers included, to make a strong statement.
- At the same time, language should be clear but not inflammatory.
- Wording should show that the budgetary shortfall is a cumulative effect over several years, not a sudden phenomenon of the current year. However, it should be clear that budgetary cuts are a persistent problem, not a one-time event.
- Councilors made other minor corrections and changes to the wording.
Discussion of action clauses
Councilors again made suggestions for changes. The fourth action clause was dropped entirely.
The final version of the Council’s motion is attached to the minutes of the November 8, 2006 meeting.
Newhagen then proposed the approval of the motion, Peres seconded. There was no debate and all approved.
The motion will be sent to the Provost, Senate and Chancellor. It was decided not to send it directly to the Diamondback, but wait until the Senate had seen it.
Topic: Fall Planning
Klumpp passed out a list of potential tasks for the 2006-07 year and asked the Councilors to consider it. He also promised to work out a schedule of the next meetings.
The meeting adjourned at 11:45 a.m.
