University of California/StanfordGovernment Information Librarians Group
Second Annual Meeting
Minutes September 23, 1994
10am-3pm
California State Library and Courts Building
Room 500
Sacramento
University of California/Stanford
Present: Tom Andersen, California State Library; Tony Angiletta, Stanford (CDC Liaison); Kay Collins, Irvine; Patricia Cruse, San Diego; Sherry DeDecker, Santa Barbara; Joanne Donovan, San Diego; Chuck Eckman, Berkeley (Convener, Recorder); Ron Heckart, Berkeley; Cynthia Jahns, San Diego; Linda Kennedy, Davis; Lauri Kram, Los Angeles; Joan Loftus, Stanford; Janet Martorana, Santa Barbara; Marcia Meister, Davis; Margaret Mooney, Riverside; Joanne Nelson, Santa Cruz; Andrea Sevetson, Berkeley; Pei Shiu, Irvine; Juri Stratford, Davis.
Guests: Laine Farley, UCOP.
-Group membership. Representatives from the University of Southern California, University of Nevada-Reno and the California State Library were invited to the Group's meeting as a courtesy. Although not formally part of the Group, their collections are a part of the context for government documents cooperative collection development in the region. The University of Nevada, Las Vegas, should be added to the list of invitees.
-GOVINFO list processor. L.Kennedy announced that a "govinfo" list processor has been established and is available for the Group to use as a discussion forum. Members may subscribe by sending electronic mail to "listproc@ucdavis.edu". The text of the message should read "subscribe govinfo [your name]". The discussion is not moderated, but Linda moderates the names of those who subscribe.
-UC/Stanford Government Documents/Government Information Department Directory. L.Kennedy reported that she has received updates to the Directory from most members of the UC/Stanford group. Corrections and additions are due no later than November 1 to L.Kennedy. An updated guide will be distributed shortly thereafter.
-Microforms Union List. L.Kennedy reported that she still has not received updates from UCB and CSL. The group agreed that the Northern California list should be upgraded to a Statewide List. Copies of the older edition were distributed and contributors are requested to send additions and corrections to L.Kennedy by no later than November 1. In annotating the lists, campuses should mark with an asterisk materials that are available via the direct loan program.
-Internet-accessible versions of directories. The Group agreed that the latest version of the Department Directory and the Microforms Union List should be placed on "InfoLib" (UC Berkeley Library Gopher). Access instructions will be provided as soon as the documents are available electronically.
L.Farley asked for comments regarding CQ Washington Alert. Discussion focussed on the system's slow response rates even in non-peak hours, and problems with the "log" (e-mailing results) function. Comments should be sent to "cq@dla.ucop.edu". L.Farley will forward the Group's concern regarding these two major problems to Sherry Willhite. The Group also discussed the update function mentioned in a recent message from Amber Wightman. The update function did not seem practical for statewide corporate use. Several campuses expressed an interest in resubscribing to the APN and Greenwire news services through CQ.
-Los Angeles. The new Library of Maps and Government Information (MGI) opened on September 19th. This Library represents a merger of the former Public Affairs Service and Map Library collections. Material that has been stored at SRLF will be represented in MELVYL, but ORION has unique information related to MGI holdings. When questions arise, consult the MGI Reference Desk.
-Berkeley. The Government Documents Library stack collection is currently being merged into the new Main Stacks, and in early October the Library's microfilm and unbound journals will be merged with Newspaper/Microforms and Periodicals. The new Government and Social Science Information Service (GSSI) will open either December 5 or December 12. -Stanford is still planning for a Social Science Resource Center, which will include an Academic Data Service. The Center will provide users with access to reference materials, data collections, bibliographic databases. There will be no reference desk per se, but users will be able to make appointment with bibliographers and area curators.
-Irvine. Reference desk hours have been increased. Government Documents reference/circulation and technical processing operations are being merged. Retrospective conversion is moving forward: when complete, fewer materials will be available via direct loan.
-San Diego. A campus-wide open forum was held and there was broad expression of interest in separating documents reference from general reference. The reference staff is currently studying options.
T.Angiletta reported on CDC Activities. A joint retreat for the Heads of Systems-Heads of Public Services-Heads of Technical Services-Collection Development Committee is being held at Berkeley on October 7. Campus representatives are bringing their top 4-5 agenda items for discussion. Mini-SCAP funding and CRL membership are ongoing, unresolved issues.
C.Eckman presented the draft Agreement on the Cooperative Development of Access to Government Information among the University of California/Stanford Libraries. Discussion focussed on three areas. The scope of the microforms list should be expanded from former SCAP-funded titles to include all titles that are held at three or fewer campuses and that the Group wishes to protect from potential loss within the System (e.g., Declassified Documents; CIS hearings and prints; GATT documents; UNDP Project Reports; and others). The procedures for adding new sets to the list should be clarified. The goal should be made more explicit in terms of protecting at-risk collections.
ACTION: C.Eckman will revise the draft accordingly and circulate via the "govinfo" list processor. After comments are received, the Agreement will be forwarded to the Collection Development Committee.
C.Eckman presented a proposal from Berkeley for joint purchase of UN Development Programme Project Reports on microfiche 1981-1993. Berkeley will provide a major portion of the discounted pre-publication offer if the collection is sited at Berkeley, or a portion of the price if sited elsewhere. This type of proposal has been implemented successfully in other CDC selector groups. Interested members of the group should contact C.Eckman following the meeting.
The Group identified several major microform sets that have been picked up already by a member of the Group, including CIS Executive Branch Documents (Stanford; University of Nevada-Reno); CIS Presidential Directives (Stanford); CIS Executive Orders (Riverside).
-Official Gazettes. UCLA is considering cancelling the majority of its collection of foreign official gazettes. CRL's holdings are a key cooperative reliance issue for the Group. T.Angiletta will raise with the CRL board.
-Foreign Documents. Background materials for the discussion included David Rozkuszka's white paper on foreign documents and the Africana Librarians Council of the African Studies Association draft paper entitled "Government Documents Resources in Research Libraries: Implications for International and African government Publications" dated April 1994. African documents are particularly at-risk in the context of documents consolidation and staff reassignments/reductions. Cooperation in this area is now more challenging because area specialists are increasingly being used to cover foreign documents.
ACTION: C.Eckman will contact the John Rawlings at Stanford (area curator responsible for African documents) regarding the possibility of coordinating African documents selection. As soon as an African documents selector is identified at UCLA, they will be invited to participate in cooperative work. The Group will continue to monitor the issue of foreign documents acquisition within UC/Stanford.
-OAS. OAS documents are difficult to obtain reliably. C.Eckman mentioned two vendors Berkeley is experimenting with in terms of OAS document service: APS and Pan-American Books. He will forward vendor address information to "govinfo".
L.Kram and A.Sevetson reviewed the census networks currently available at UCLA and UCB respectively. UCSD is accessing the UCB Network. The two networks operate differently in terms of fees (UCLA is fee-based; UCB is free); data (UCLA is based on tape; UCB on CD-ROMs); access (UCLA is based on menu-driven SAS interface; UCB uses Census Bureau Go and Extract software); support (UCLA is fully supported by OAC; UCB has more tenuous DOE support).
It is very important that some form of Systemwide access to Census data be established. The April 1994 minutes of the Heads of Public Services indicated that HOPS was proposing a Task Force to be charged with working on development of UC-wide strategies for accessing and delivering non-bibliographic electronic resources (including census and GIS), and that this group would include representation from documents and maps librarians. There has been no indication that this group has been estabished and charged.
ACTION:L. Krma, A.Sevetson, and T.Angiletta will draft a letter to HOPS and CDC describing the two Census networks, re-emphasizing the need for Systemwide access, and proposing the names of interested Government Information Librarians Group members for participation on the proposed HOPS task force. The letter will be run by Group members on the "govinfo" list and then sent to HOPS and CDC on behalf of the Group.
L.Kennedy and Laine Farley presented the possibility of providing Systemwide access to GPO Access as a MELVYL USE database. GPO Access currently includes full text of the Federal Register, the Congressional Record, and enrolled Congressional bills. Currently libraries must have WAIS client software in order to login to GPO Acces, and they are restricted to one IP address (and one simultaneous use). However, under the pilot program Gil Baldwin (LPS Project Manager) outlined in electronic mail, each depository library can receive 10 simultaneous uses (potentially 90 within UC) if they provide access over a network such as MELVYL or a community freenet. Discussion focussed on the question of whether MELVYL could handle a potential large volume of traffic related to GPO Access.
ACTION: L.Kennedy, P.Cruse, and A.Sevetson will draft a letter addressed to the UL's, the chairs of HOPS and CDC, and other appropriate persons with a proposal for program participation. The proposal will include unlimited access to GPO Access as a starting point, with a fall-back position involving some form of access restrictions if necessary due to system load.
The group agreed to continue with its practice of identifying a Group Convener rather than Chair. This meets the CDC requirements for selector group organization according to T.Angiletta. L.Kram will serve as Convener for the September 1995 meeting which will be held in Southern California. That meeting will again be closely coordinated with the California Depository Library Conference in terms of date and location. L.Kram will work with K.Collins, who is assisting in planning for the 1995 California Depository Library Conference.
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Maintained by: Sherry DeDecker
Updated: 10/11/04 08:30:48