October 4, 2021 Librarian’s Report

Personnel – Our Summer help did a fine job.  She was from South Glens Falls and dependent on her parents for transportation so she was not able to do as many hours as were available.  Michael is scheduled for surgery at the end of October and will be out for a week or two and then be in a cast for 6 weeks.  This may effect my ability to take the rest of my vacation time before the end of the year. 

3rd Quarter programs – In house programming is still suspended.  Farm2Library –The program is extremely popular – we have had 832 pickups of food items since we resumed.  The donation for extra fruit got us an extra box of fruit for 8 weeks.  We will be stopping for the year at the end of October and will resume in the spring.  The Summer Reading Program was very different this year.  We had story times under the pavilion at Pagenstacher Park (thanks to the Village for allowing this.)  We had some outside programs including rocket launches, sidewalk games, and a children’s-books-only sale.  Rainbow Nursery came for a special rocket launch.  Sign-ups were lower than usual and follow through on reporting reading, and attendance at programs was spotty.

Upcoming programs – We will be doing more take and make programs, but haven’t had the time to pull this together yet.

SALS & Directors’ Council – Jack is working proactively to help cut down on hacking attempts on our websites.  SALS is offering Construction Grants and Continuing Education Grants for next year.  Application deadline is November 1.  This is the last year the Continuing Education Grant will be offered.  SALS is working on their new Plan of Service.  The Notary Public Program is available again this fall.  Safety issues were brought up as a couple of the small libraries have had some harassment issues over the summer.  SALS strongly recommends that if at all possible there be no shifts of only one worker.

Joint Automation Council / computers –The new laptop is here.  There was an issue with Michael’s computer.  The machine has to be sent to JA for work and they were able to get it fixed.

Friends – We are still not taking book donations right now.  The goal was to resume taking donations at some time in the fall.  We had two small sales this summer and did a couple of book giveaways, but the sale room is still pretty full.  I can’t see taking donations until after we can have a normal sale. We will be doing another sale in conjunction with the Fall Festival October 16.

Maintenance – We purchased a new cordless phone which is working fine.  Tuff Kote resurfaced the ramp at the beginning of September.  Furnace maintenance is scheduled for later this month.  Michael and I did a Staff Development Day and worked on cleaning out the basement – a great deal of progress was made.

Other – The Tax Cap reporting will be done this month. 

Meetings attended in third quarter 2021 (all were virtual):

7/20                 webinar (Michael)                                          7/23     webinar

8/13                 webinar                                                           8/18     Directors Council

9/2                   Bicentennial wrap up meeting                        9/20     HR webinar