ACRL College & Research Libraries News

College & Research Libraries News

ACRL executive summary

Fall came to Chicago very gently this year. Many groups held meetings around the country in which ACRL members and staff participated. Much agitation surrounded LC’s threat to license the MARC database in a restrictive fashion. Although a moratorium was declared, the issues will need to be openly debated; a start will be made at Midwinter at the ALCTS forum on Saturday afternoon.

Many of ACRL’s chapters met in October. Three sites hosted visits from the ACRL Speakers Bureau: the Oregon/Washington joint meeting was addressed by Bill Moffett, who also went to Louisiana; and the Georgia Chapter speaker was JoAn Segal.

Copies of three ACRL standards: for university libraries, college libraries, and two-year institutions, were mailed to all members of the Council on Postsecondary Accreditation.

The H. W. Wilson-funded study on Alternative Sources of Funding for Academic Libraries began with a meeting of the Advisory Committee, chaired by Anne Beaubien, at which the group worked with project director Mary Jo Lynch to develop a questionnaire. It is hoped the study will yield a document to parallel “Non-tax Sources of Revenue for Public Libraries,” which was released earlier this year as a result of an earlier Wilson-funded project.

Liaison efforts included visits by President Bill Moffett to the meetings of EDUCOM in Ann Arbor and the Association of Research Libraries in Washington, D.C., as well as by Moffett and Segal to the Oberlin Group meeting at the Claremont, Whittier, and Occidental campuses in Southern California.

Financial reports for the year ended August 31, 1989, showed higher revenues than budgeted (mostly due to the Cincinnati Conference success) and an excess revenue for the year of $149,000. This brings the fund balance back above its basic level, as frequently happens in the year of the national conference. Although a deficit is projected in the 1990 operating budget, it is expected that this “cushion” will allow us to end the year with the fund balance at the level mandated (50% of average annual expenses). Membership was up by 6.3% to 10,739 (9,587 personal and 1,152 organizational members).

President-elect candidates Anne Beaubien and Maxine Reneker visited headquarters October 6 to meet the staff and be briefed on association affairs. Other visitors included Mike Kathman, Planning Committee chair. Pat Swanson, Professional Education Committee chair, hosted a visit from Segal in nearby Hyde Park.—JoAn S. Segal, ACRL Executive Director.