Yazmin Mehdi: Okay.
Yazmin Mehdi: Okay, welcome everyone. It is now 1101. We have a quorum and I'd like to call
Yazmin Mehdi: this regular meeting of the Seattle Public Library Board of Trustees to order.
Yazmin Mehdi: If there are no changes to the agenda, may I hear a motion to approve the agenda
Yazmin Mehdi: as published?
Bendixen, Carmen: So moved.
Faith Pettis: Second.
Yazmin Mehdi: All in favor, please say aye. Aye.
Tom Fay: Yeah.
Faith Pettis: I.
Bendixen, Carmen: Kai.
Yazmin Mehdi: That passes. As noted at the top of the agenda,
Yazmin Mehdi: the library board is accepting public comment that is directed to matters on
Yazmin Mehdi: the agenda by email, in person at the Central Library and in
Yazmin Mehdi: this remote meeting. Is there any public comment, Amy?
Hybrid Meeting Cart 01: There is no public comment by any of the three methods for this meeting.
Yazmin Mehdi: Okay. In which case, let's move on. We need Ron to be able to vote on the
Yazmin Mehdi: consent agenda. So we're going to move on from that and
Yazmin Mehdi: come back to that when Ron is able to join us. So Tom, over to you,
Yazmin Mehdi: Chief Librarian Report.
Tom Fay: Right.
Tom Fay: Start O'Neill.
Tom Fay: Switch gears here. There we go. My mic was giving me problems. Thank you.
Tom Fay: A few things of note. I met with the superintendent of Seattle
Tom Fay: Public Schools at the 1st of June. Ben Scholldiner.
Tom Fay: It was just a good introduction.
Tom Fay: As far as what the library has been doing, working with the school,
Tom Fay: some of the efforts we've had in the past and where we hope to work with them in
Tom Fay: the future. As many of you might know, they do have quite a bit of budget
Tom Fay: challenges coming up this year as well. So I think we'll be touching base a few
Tom Fay: times during the course of this year to see where they're at.
Tom Fay: Moving forward.
Tom Fay: On June 6th through the 10th, I, along with quite a few of the folks from
Tom Fay: our wonderful foundation, including Brian Lawrence,
Tom Fay: attended the 10th Annual International Public Library Fundraising Conference.
Tom Fay: As many of you might know or recall, that was co-founded by the Seattle Public
Tom Fay: Library Foundation and Carl Bloom Associates.
Tom Fay: A decade ago, and now it is one of the.
Tom Fay: kind of staples of foundation advancement and development in the country for public
Tom Fay: libraries. When I walked into the room over 10 years
Tom Fay: ago, it was a very few people. There were about 300 in attendance this
Tom Fay: particular time. It's almost outgrowing its ability to be
Tom Fay: in a library.
Yazmin Mehdi: Hello.
Tom Fay: I want to thank the Columbus Library System for really doing a great job
Tom Fay: hosting. Everything was perfect, from the venue to the recommendations.
Tom Fay: Really appreciated Lawrence Hospitality, who's the Executive Director there. Well,
Tom Fay: great.
Tom Fay: Great work by their team.
Tom Fay: A couple of things to note around branch closures currently.
Tom Fay: As some of you might recall, we have the International District
Tom Fay: Chinatown branch closed. They were remediating an odor issue
Tom Fay: reported by staff. It was found to be coming from the wall.
Tom Fay: There's been much work done to clean and repair it. And while we had hoped
Tom Fay: as in my report, to have us reopened by June 29th.
Tom Fay: That is going to probably be no sooner than July 6th.
Tom Fay: We're working through the final remediation issues with the contractor
Tom Fay: and the landlord to make sure everything is satisfactory before opening and
Tom Fay: getting staff back in and then opening up.
Tom Fay: to the public. So we will keep you up to date on that
Tom Fay: when we have a final date so that you're all aware of its reopening.
Tom Fay: The Rainier Bay, I'll use all my words here today,
Tom Fay: the Rainier Beach branch has been closed from June 4th through the 26th.
Tom Fay: While repairs and energy efficiency improvements are made,
Tom Fay: we look forward to the branch welcoming folks back.
Tom Fay: for the summer. And right now, that's still on schedule.
Tom Fay: We hope to see that building open up again by tomorrow.
Tom Fay: We'll let you know if something changes, but that branch will have some great
Tom Fay: improvements to its HVAC systems.
Tom Fay: And just a note for everyone, I will be heading out to the American
Tom Fay: Library Association tomorrow. It is in Chicago.
Tom Fay: I'll be there for three or four days with a bunch of vendor meetings. Pardon me,
Tom Fay: and it's the 150th anniversary of the American Library Association. So
Tom Fay: They are back in their hometown of Chicago for that event, so that's great.
Tom Fay: Just a side note in this, for all those who have worked with Sarah
Tom Fay: Johns, our state Librarian, you might recall she's retiring here in
Tom Fay: June. I will be attending her retirement party
Tom Fay: at the Obama.
Tom Fay: Library Event Center on, I think it's Sunday.
Tom Fay: So looking forward to that event. Of course,
Tom Fay: also seeing the Obama Library will be most certainly a fun thing to attend.
Faith Pettis: Wow.
Tom Fay: And that sums up my report pretty brief this month, but anyone have any questions?
Yazmin Mehdi: I see Carmen has a question.
Tom Fay: Okay.
Bendixen, Carmen: Yeah, well, I'm excited for your trip for you, Tom,
Bendixen, Carmen: but my question was about the U District branch and if everything was still on
Yazmin Mehdi: Yeah.
Bendixen, Carmen: track with that.
Tom Fay: That one I'm waiting for additional information on.
Tom Fay: I got some word this morning that we may be delayed a little bit on that.
Tom Fay: I'm trying to figure out what the delays are for.
Tom Fay: We had hoped to be somewhere in the September,
Tom Fay: early September opening that may have slipped.
Tom Fay: I'll have more information as I get to the end of the day and I'll try to send a
Tom Fay: note out to the board.
Tom Fay: before I hop on a plane if I get more details.
Bendixen, Carmen: Okay, thanks.
Yazmin Mehdi: That would be great. And also, Tom, I know that the Rainier Beach closure was
Yazmin Mehdi: a planned closure to do the work that you described. So that's not of concern.
Tom Fay: Correct.
Yazmin Mehdi: But obviously, the Chinatown International District
Yazmin Mehdi: branch
Yazmin Mehdi: That was not a planned closure. Nobody wants to close a branch because of
Yazmin Mehdi: a bad odor. But I just wanted to underscore that my
Yazmin Mehdi: understanding is that the library has been working effectively with the
Bendixen, Carmen: I.
Yazmin Mehdi: landlord who owns the actual building.
Yazmin Mehdi: to remediate the problem. So it sounds like everyone's doing
Yazmin Mehdi: everything they can to get that branch reopened as quickly as possible. Is that?
Tom Fay: They have, yes, and they have been responsive as we've
Tom Fay: gone through it. Our team's been Capital Finance has been
Tom Fay: working with them. They manage the leases and the landlord
Tom Fay: has been responsive throughout the process.
Yazmin Mehdi: That's great to hear. Because obviously it's important for the
Yazmin Mehdi: public to know that the library actually owns most of our buildings where we have
Yazmin Mehdi: library branches open, but there are a few where we are actually
Yazmin Mehdi: a tenant and we have to rely on the landlord to help when there are building
Yazmin Mehdi: issues. So
Yazmin Mehdi: And this is one of those cases, unfortunately.
Yazmin Mehdi: But nobody wants to work in an environment where it smells bad.
Yazmin Mehdi: So especially because usually a bad smell indicates something underlying that's
Yazmin Mehdi: probably even less pleasant than the smell. Yeah, so
Tom Fay: Yes.
Yazmin Mehdi: Looking forward to having that reopen though.
Yazmin Mehdi: Any other questions for my colleagues for Tom?
Yazmin Mehdi: What I'd like to do is quickly note a couple of things from the reports that
Yazmin Mehdi: are in the packet that we will not hear from staff about. One was the,
Yazmin Mehdi: I'm not sure I'll pronounce it correctly, but Deng Kien co-op work.
Yazmin Mehdi: And I just wanted to like thank staff for that program.
Yazmin Mehdi: One of the things that was really interesting to me to read about was the
Yazmin Mehdi: idea of co-creating programs with the community that really best serve their
Yazmin Mehdi: actual needs as opposed to
Yazmin Mehdi: the library saying, well, this is the programming that this
Yazmin Mehdi: community needs and we're going to impose that upon you.
Yazmin Mehdi: This idea of co-creation is one that I think I may have first heard from Kate
Yazmin Mehdi: Tang or Tom. And I find this really interesting work
Yazmin Mehdi: and I really appreciate the chance to read about how the library is doing that.
Yazmin Mehdi: One thing that stuck out from that one is this, you know,
Yazmin Mehdi: basically interest-free loan and loans and how important that those are to
Tom Fay: Yep.
Yazmin Mehdi: particular communities, especially because, you know,
Yazmin Mehdi: one of the ways of interpreting
Yazmin Mehdi: Islam is that, you know, it's against the religion to, you know,
Yazmin Mehdi: take on or charge interest. So the idea that the community would come
Yazmin Mehdi: together and figure out ways to encourage businesses without loans that have
Tom Fay: Ku.
Yazmin Mehdi: interest is, that's a big deal.
Yazmin Mehdi: Anyone who's run a business, I'm sure, understands that, you know,
Yazmin Mehdi: often you have to take out a loan to make investments in your business.
Yazmin Mehdi: So I wanted to just quick call that out. Also,
Yazmin Mehdi: there's a celebration on July 9th from 1230 to 230 at Beacon. And
Yazmin Mehdi: I'm going to try to get to that for this program.
Yazmin Mehdi: And so just encourage my colleagues and of course, if there's a quorum of us,
Yazmin Mehdi: we have to stay away from each other. But it would be not a bad thing to have
Yazmin Mehdi: more than one board member there. Also wanted to note the Sunday science
Yazmin Mehdi: parties that were written about. Those sounded awesome.
Yazmin Mehdi: And I love the idea of the Dia de los Ninos programs that were in languages
Tom Fay: Yeah.
Yazmin Mehdi: other than Spanish. One thing, you know, I was missing in May from our board
Yazmin Mehdi: meeting and I was in Peru and got a chance to
Yazmin Mehdi: meet, you know, a lot of people there speak Quechua,
Yazmin Mehdi: not just Spanish. And these languages go really far back.
Yazmin Mehdi: I have an avocational interest in linguistics,
Yazmin Mehdi: and so for the library to help create opportunities for these languages that
Yazmin Mehdi: might otherwise
Yazmin Mehdi: you know, die out to be spoken is really important
Yazmin Mehdi: so that we don't lose those languages. Last thing is I read about Ken Gonzales
Yazmin Mehdi: Rud Aaliyah, who celebrated 35 years as an employee at
Yazmin Mehdi: the library, and I just want to wish him well for his
Yazmin Mehdi: work.
Yazmin Mehdi: That's dedication, 35 years of work. So hats off to Ken.
Yazmin Mehdi: And then the last thing, there's a great report from IT.
Yazmin Mehdi: And one of the things that kind of stood out for me was this idea of self-serve
Yazmin Mehdi: installation of software.
Yazmin Mehdi: And that might sound risky, but the idea that IT has come up with
Yazmin Mehdi: ways for some software to be installed that doesn't cause potential risk is
Yazmin Mehdi: terrific because of course,
Yazmin Mehdi: the work that they do is so important, not only to the public side of library
Yazmin Mehdi: operations, but obviously to the internal side of
Yazmin Mehdi: library operations. So any kind of efficiencies that they can
Yazmin Mehdi: gain mean that they can keep their attention on public side things.
Yazmin Mehdi: or enterprise-wide systems that, you know, if they fail,
Yazmin Mehdi: a lot of things don't happen. So anyway, thanks for indulging me, you guys.
Yazmin Mehdi: I like to call that stuff out because otherwise we, you know,
Yazmin Mehdi: those folks may think that we don't read these reports, but we actually do.
Yazmin Mehdi: So, before I move on, does any, yeah, I see Faith.
Tom Fay: I.
Faith Pettis: Yeah, and I had, thank you for doing that, Yazmin,
Faith Pettis: because I had wanted to call out the blanket fort reading parties.
Faith Pettis: I thought that was just so special and brilliant of the librarians to come up
Faith Pettis: with that idea. I can see how that would appeal to a
Faith Pettis: child, and the science fair things resonated
Faith Pettis: with me as well. What a great use of the libraries to
Faith Pettis: stimulate
Faith Pettis: and give an opportunity for kids to engage with scientists and on science
Faith Pettis: projects in a way that is super accessible.
Faith Pettis: So the reports this month were really interesting. Appreciate it.
Faith Pettis: And thanks to the staff for putting them together.
Tom Fay: And I just want to mention a few other things. So thanks for starting it out,
Tom Fay: Yazmin and Faith. But on the collab, it's been a huge effort over the last
Tom Fay: year. I want to thank Tina Mat, Jay Lyman, obviously for their work in community.
Tom Fay: Tina is, you know,
Tom Fay: She is the central hub in the southeast region and really promotes what we've
Tom Fay: talked about in the strategic plan of a community hub.
Tom Fay: You can see that as you read through that document.
Tom Fay: I also want to thank Kate Tang for supporting them and working with our
Tom Fay: capital improvement team to improve the space.
Tom Fay: We still have a little more to go in that space, but
Tom Fay: compared to where we were a year, a little over a year ago.
Tom Fay: You can actually hear each other now because we put in a little air
Tom Fay: conditioning unit that actually keeps the room cool without blowing something that
Tom Fay: sounds like a jet engine into the room. They've got some new technology that
Tom Fay: they'll have available, ability to
Tom Fay: charge devices and connect into the monitors, etc.
Tom Fay: So a lot of good work there and much more going on in that community. And yes,
Tom Fay: I did love the Fort, Planket Fort. I know I did plenty of those with a child,
Tom Fay: so I truly appreciated that. Maybe my crawling around down on that
Tom Fay: level isn't as good anymore, but
Tom Fay: I still thought it was a fun idea. And I think the one thing the IT piece
Tom Fay: also gives you is a very good sense of the amount of work that's going on daily.
Tom Fay: We highlight many things here and it's very hard often to get enough time in
Tom Fay: these meetings to be able to show all this.
Tom Fay: I think the Q1 marketing and online services
Tom Fay: Review also shows the massive amount of work that's always going on with that
Tom Fay: unit and team and really how they're putting the library forward in front of
Tom Fay: everyone in the online realm. So some really great work here and some
Tom Fay: really good reports. So I really appreciate everybody's effort
Tom Fay: and thank you for reading them all.
Yazmin Mehdi: Yeah, I know I'm not alone.
Yazmin Mehdi: Let's, if you don't mind, Tom, can we go back and approve the consent
Yazmin Mehdi: agenda with now that Ron is on? Welcome, Ron.
Tom Fay: Please do.
Yazmin Mehdi: So this is the consent agenda basically consists of the minutes from the May
Yazmin Mehdi: regular meeting. And so if no one has changes to these
Yazmin Mehdi: documents, may I hear a motion to approve the
Yazmin Mehdi: consent agenda
Yazmin Mehdi: Published.
Faith Pettis: So moved.
Bendixen, Carmen: Second.
Ron Chew: Second.
Yazmin Mehdi: Great. And all in favor, please say I.
Faith Pettis: Yeah.
Bendixen, Carmen: Bye.
Faith Pettis: Yeah.
Ron Chew: Kai.
Yazmin Mehdi: Great. Thank you all. And I, for the record,
Yazmin Mehdi: have to abstain because I was not at that meeting.
Yazmin Mehdi: Although I did enjoy reading the meeting minutes. And I see Sean's on the call.
Yazmin Mehdi: So Sean Lanksbury, if you want any background on the art
Yazmin Mehdi: review
Yazmin Mehdi: committee, I'd be glad to talk to you about that,
Yazmin Mehdi: because I wrote that when I worked for the library a million years ago.
Yazmin Mehdi: So anyway, I think just to close that, that passed not quite unanimously,
Yazmin Mehdi: but we can move on and go back to you, Tom, with the system reports.
Tom Fay: Thank you. We've got Rick Sheridan, who will be coming forward,
Tom Fay: and he will be giving a strategic plan mid-year update.
Tom Fay: I know Jessica Smith also worked on this. She's not available today,
Tom Fay: and Rick's going to step in and go through the report with you all.
Yazmin Mehdi: Great. Welcome, Rick.
Rick Sheridan: Thank you. Appreciate the opportunity to present
Rick Sheridan: today. Let me share my screen.
Rick Sheridan: All right, I hope you can see that.
Rick Sheridan: Okay, appreciate the opportunity to present
Rick Sheridan: today about the strategic plan, 10-year strategic plan for the Seattle
Rick Sheridan: Public Library. Jessica Smith was to join me here today
Rick Sheridan: to provide an update, but unfortunately she is unable to do so.
Rick Sheridan: Our agenda for this part of the session, this presentation,
Rick Sheridan: is really to provide an overview on the work of the library system over the past
Rick Sheridan: year and what our focus is for 2026. So our agenda will be a brief overview on
Rick Sheridan: the plan itself for people that might be new to it.
Rick Sheridan: We'll talk about the six impact areas that exist within the strategic plan.
Rick Sheridan: both in terms of accomplishments for 2025, but also what the library focused on in
Rick Sheridan: terms of priorities for 2026, and then our planning for 2027.
Rick Sheridan: One second, unfortunately, I seem to be showing my notes as well.
Faith Pettis: They're not visible to us.
Rick Sheridan: Okay, oh, that's great to hear. Excellent.
Tom Fay: Yeah, me.
Rick Sheridan: Let's move forward then.
Rick Sheridan: So the strategic plan for new staff members or members of the public that
Rick Sheridan: might be listening in, it is our 10-year plan developed with
Rick Sheridan: significant input from the public and staff over many years.
Rick Sheridan: It outlines our mission to bring people, information,
Rick Sheridan: and ideas together to enrich lives and empower the community.
Rick Sheridan: And it has six key impact areas.
Rick Sheridan: three that are focused on the patron, literacy, empowerment and enrichment,
Rick Sheridan: and then three that are more internally focused, funding, capacity,
Rick Sheridan: and then building technology and sustainability,
Rick Sheridan: that it's the work we do inside of the library to make sure that we can
Rick Sheridan: appropriately serve the public and our community.
Rick Sheridan: So the first impact area I'd focus on would be that of literacy. So in 2025,
Rick Sheridan: we had a number of significant accomplishments. Now,
Rick Sheridan: this is obviously not all that the library focused on in 2025,
Rick Sheridan: but these were key areas of emphasis for the library system to ensure that we're
Rick Sheridan: meeting the goals of our strategic plan. So we established a story squad at
Rick Sheridan: Bailey Gatzert for second grade classrooms to ensure that we were
Rick Sheridan: providing classroom sets to meet the needs of those students and their
Rick Sheridan: teachers. We established a board policy approved by
Rick Sheridan: you in 2025 to ensure that we were effectively governing the use of AI
Rick Sheridan: within the library system.
Rick Sheridan: And we spent a lot of time focused on ensuring that patrons who use English as
Rick Sheridan: their primary language had the resources or access to resources that they needed
Rick Sheridan: so they could be successful users of the library system.
Rick Sheridan: And so that ran the gamut from working with the foundation to secure a Carnegie
Rick Sheridan: Grant for English as a second language,
Rick Sheridan: adding Portuguese to our world languages collection,
Rick Sheridan: and doing more work to ensure that access to library services and programs were
Rick Sheridan: equitable beyond just English language offerings.
Rick Sheridan: for 2026, at the beginning of the year, we focused on these goals as the key
Rick Sheridan: elements for us in terms of achieving our strategic plan across the 10 year span.
Rick Sheridan: And so for 2026, we focus, our focus will be on evaluating the Story
Rick Sheridan: Squad program and then expanding it. And we are on track to do an expansion to
Rick Sheridan: additional Title 1 schools in the fall of 2026.
Rick Sheridan: We're moving forward with AI governance within the library system itself.
Rick Sheridan: So based on the board policy, we have a charter drafted that's been
Rick Sheridan: reviewed by the senior management team for an AI governance committee.
Rick Sheridan: And that committee will then help us use AI within the system,
Rick Sheridan: both in support of patrons and staff,
Rick Sheridan: in a way that we think is deliberate and makes sense in accordance with the board
Rick Sheridan: policy. We additionally said for 2026, we would do a refresh of our summer
Rick Sheridan: program offerings. And obviously we have launched Summer
Rick Sheridan: Quest as a replacement to the summer of learning.
Rick Sheridan: And that is our new focus to ensure that is in all ages,
Rick Sheridan: literacy focused effort that really sort of helps promote joy of reading,
Rick Sheridan: joy of learning as part of a summer effort. And then lastly,
Rick Sheridan: one of the things we're going to focus on this year is establishing standards for
Rick Sheridan: early literacy components for our pre-K programming.
Rick Sheridan: and we'll do that once we have an assistant director within LEED,
Rick Sheridan: who this will be part of their portfolio in terms of enhancing programming within
Rick Sheridan: the library system.
Yazmin Mehdi: Rick, can I just stop you for a second there?
Yazmin Mehdi: The term all ages varies based on context. And here, can you just clarify,
Yazmin Mehdi: I think when you say all ages here, you're not talking about from birth to
Yazmin Mehdi: seniors.
Yazmin Mehdi: But maybe I'm wrong. And when I say seniors,
Yazmin Mehdi: I don't mean seniors in high school or college. I mean seniors, like.
Rick Sheridan: So actually our goal was to move this beyond just students or people,
Yazmin Mehdi: Okay.
Rick Sheridan: elementary school, middle schools, high schoolers,
Yazmin Mehdi: Okay.
Rick Sheridan: but rather have this be something that potentially could reach people who might
Rick Sheridan: be seniors, quite frankly, senior citizens.
Yazmin Mehdi: Okay.
Rick Sheridan: We really wanted this to be an all ages effort in terms of
Rick Sheridan: working to support the literacy and reading interest of everyone within the
Rick Sheridan: community, not just students.
Yazmin Mehdi: Great. Thank you for clarifying. One of the things I just would like to
Yazmin Mehdi: nevertheless underscore here is, especially given that Tom recently met
Yazmin Mehdi: with the head of Seattle Public Schools, is the important role that the library
Yazmin Mehdi: plays in the, you know, the
Yazmin Mehdi: the learning gap that is the summer. So I'm glad that the all ages is just an
Yazmin Mehdi: expansion beyond school age kids so that, you know, we're capturing other folks,
Yazmin Mehdi: but we continue to play our role in helping make sure that students aren't
Yazmin Mehdi: backsliding during the summer.
Tom Fay: Yeah, and I think the important thing to note
Tom Fay: here is that, you know, by having it be intergenerational as well,
Tom Fay: you know, many families may read together or even
Tom Fay: seeing reading in the home is such an important piece for children.
Tom Fay: This all plays a role in how children develop and begin to
Tom Fay: become good readers.
Yazmin Mehdi: That makes a lot of sense to me and I'll look forward to hearing, you know,
Yazmin Mehdi: what you guys learned from this.
Yazmin Mehdi: Sorry, Rick, back to you.
Rick Sheridan: All right, thank you, Madam President. Turning to our next impact area,
Rick Sheridan: that of empowerment for 2025, we're proud of the fact that we
Rick Sheridan: established a new review and planning process for library programs to include a
Rick Sheridan: quarterly planning calendar and strategy meetings to ensure that we were meeting
Rick Sheridan: the programmatic needs of our patrons and doing so in a systematic way.
Rick Sheridan: such that we were addressing community interest, we were serving language needs,
Rick Sheridan: we were having consistency of program offerings across the system.
Rick Sheridan: And I think one of the best ways to sort of the proof of the library's work in
Rick Sheridan: this space is that if you were to go to the SPL website,
Rick Sheridan: the screenshot that I've captured here on the bottom side shows just a small slice
Rick Sheridan: of the offerings that we have as a library system.
Rick Sheridan: that really run the range of different programmatic activities.
Rick Sheridan: And so something is related to Summer Quest, Kaleidoscope Play and Learn,
Rick Sheridan: Tax Help, we really want to make sure that we are
Rick Sheridan: providing in a very systematic way programming that serves our community.
Rick Sheridan: So for 2026, our interest in terms of priority
Rick Sheridan: activities are to continue to lean into that work to offer better and more
Rick Sheridan: programming.
Rick Sheridan: in ways that are standardized and are better promoted by across the library
Rick Sheridan: system and give us better information about the types of people that are using
Rick Sheridan: our library system and what the outcomes are from that work. Additionally,
Rick Sheridan: we're working on or we've created standards for library displays to make
Rick Sheridan: sure that we're addressing community needs and
Rick Sheridan: One of the signs that with this work is well underway is the work we've done in
Rick Sheridan: terms of heritage months or heritage events being celebrated by the library
Rick Sheridan: system. So Jewish American Heritage Month, MENA,
Rick Sheridan: the Middle Eastern and North African Heritage Month,
Rick Sheridan: those displays have been part of the library's work recently.
Rick Sheridan: because of our emphasis thanks to the strategic plan. And then lastly,
Rick Sheridan: we have a small group working on technology to make sure that we have the
Rick Sheridan: technology in place that best serves our programmatic and service needs,
Rick Sheridan: especially when it comes to communities that have issues with things like vision
Rick Sheridan: or hearing. We want to make sure that we have the
Rick Sheridan: right technology, the newest technology in place to best
Rick Sheridan: serve
Rick Sheridan: those communities. And so we have a small group that is
Rick Sheridan: working on that right now this year.
Rick Sheridan: Turning to enrichment, 2025 accomplishments in this impact area
Rick Sheridan: include the hiring of special collection librarians to make sure that we're
Rick Sheridan: putting emphasis behind those collections. So A librarian to support the Seattle
Rick Sheridan: Room collection in terms of historical materials and a librarian at the Douglas
Rick Sheridan: Truth Branch to support the important African-American collection.
Rick Sheridan: Additionally, our marketing and online services team
Rick Sheridan: worked with local largest for a series of postcards to celebrate and encourage
Rick Sheridan: visiting all the different library branches that exist across the system,
Rick Sheridan: highlighting unique features, collections, and elements in each of these branches.
Rick Sheridan: And then lastly, in the enrichment area in 2025,
Rick Sheridan: We reached a million checkouts through Books Unbanned.
Rick Sheridan: This is the program that's funded entirely through private donations from
Rick Sheridan: the foundation that allows Seattle Public Library,
Rick Sheridan: as a member of a larger coalition, to support pushing back against
Rick Sheridan: censorship and ensuring that teens and young adults elsewhere in the United
Rick Sheridan: States have access to works that they might not be able to reach.
Rick Sheridan: within their area or their library system.
Rick Sheridan: In terms of our priority activities for 2026,
Rick Sheridan: what we're focusing on for this year in enrichment, we are going to,
Rick Sheridan: or we have actually already gone ahead and hired just this week,
Rick Sheridan: a collections archivist to increase access and use in our special collection
Rick Sheridan: at Central. We're additionally seeking additional
Rick Sheridan: funding to
Rick Sheridan: grow that special collection and additional history collections within the
Rick Sheridan: library system such that they really are of use to patrons when it comes to their
Rick Sheridan: specific field of interest. And so we're seeking additional public
Rick Sheridan: and private funds to do so. And then we continue to grow the
Rick Sheridan: coalition with Brooklyn of the number of library systems that are part of Books
Rick Sheridan: Unbanned. So at one point it was simply just the
Rick Sheridan: Seattle Public Library and
Rick Sheridan: Brooklyn, our goal is to make that collection of
Rick Sheridan: libraries larger and more robust, so everyone is pooling their resources to
Rick Sheridan: counter censorship and book banning nationally,
Rick Sheridan: and we're making a lot of progress in that regard.
Rick Sheridan: Turning to the impact area of funding, so more internally focused,
Rick Sheridan: but obviously something that serves patrons well. In 2025,
Rick Sheridan: that was the year of our preparatory work in terms of engagement, focus groups,
Rick Sheridan: surveys to understand the needs of our patrons and our community,
Rick Sheridan: in terms of library system,
Rick Sheridan: the library system to set our team up well for 2026 and the work we've been
Rick Sheridan: doing this year. Additionally, we strengthen our partnerships with the
Rick Sheridan: foundation and the Friends of the Seattle Public Library to put us on a footing so
Rick Sheridan: that when we move forward in areas of seeking additional private funding or
Rick Sheridan: promoting the library system, that we're working really as a tight
Rick Sheridan: well-nested team.
Rick Sheridan: So in 2026 in funding.
Rick Sheridan: Our key priority was the support development of the mayor's 2026 levy
Rick Sheridan: renewal proposal, which we have successfully done as a
Rick Sheridan: library system. We moved it through the process of the
Rick Sheridan: city budget office and the mayor's office. The mayor then sent the package over to
Rick Sheridan: the city council. We worked successfully with council
Rick Sheridan: members there to essentially have a measure that is now before voters for
Rick Sheridan: their consideration in August.
Rick Sheridan: Additionally, for 2026, we're also focusing on the issue of
Rick Sheridan: e-materials. And so the work of myself, Tom and Kiersten at the local,
Rick Sheridan: state and national levels in terms of e-materials,
Rick Sheridan: we're really putting a lot of emphasis in that area because we feel that only
Rick Sheridan: through advocacy from library systems like the Seattle Public Library
Rick Sheridan: Can we really turn the page on immaterial terms and conditions and pricing in a way
Rick Sheridan: that will serve the library system and our patrons?
Rick Sheridan: For the impact area of capacity in 2025, a number of successful accomplishments.
Rick Sheridan: We hired a director of belonging and inclusion, DeVante Daniels,
Rick Sheridan: who's actually on the call here today. This was thanks to private funding from
Rick Sheridan: the foundation. We were able to move forward with the
Rick Sheridan: hiring of this key role, and so we're pleased to have him on board.
Rick Sheridan: Additionally, we leaned into the area of staff
Rick Sheridan: of wellness resources that are available to them through the city or the library
Rick Sheridan: system.
Rick Sheridan: In terms of our focus for 2026, DeVante is now working on reviewing and
Rick Sheridan: updating a diversity action plan for the library system,
Rick Sheridan: and I know he's well into that effort. Additionally,
Rick Sheridan: he's also focused on policies around diversity, equity, and inclusion,
Rick Sheridan: and accessibility for the library system to make sure that we are serving
Rick Sheridan: both the public and our staff well in terms of policy. Additionally,
Rick Sheridan: there's been a lot of work internally on some key elements like onboarding,
Rick Sheridan: scheduling, and employee wellness. We're very close to being able to
Rick Sheridan: announce a new onboarding process for library staff,
Rick Sheridan: one that we think is more complete, more robust, and will ensure that staff,
Rick Sheridan: when they start working for the library system,
Rick Sheridan: are set up for success in terms of awareness of library policies,
Rick Sheridan: awareness of library training, such that they can be successful when
Rick Sheridan: they go out into their branch or elsewhere in the library system.
Rick Sheridan: Additionally, we have a small team that's working on
Rick Sheridan: selecting scheduling software for the library system.
Rick Sheridan: We're well into that process.
Rick Sheridan: We think that having a scheduling software will allow us to more
Rick Sheridan: effectively utilize the personnel that we have and schedule them more effectively
Rick Sheridan: in a way that serves both staff interest and library management needs.
Rick Sheridan: And then we're of course working to make sure that we have the right wellness
Rick Sheridan: resources in place in 2026 to make sure that staff are well cared for.
Rick Sheridan: The last impact area I'd touch upon is that of building technology,
Rick Sheridan: buildings technology and sustainability. A lot of successes in 2025.
Rick Sheridan: You see them listed here. LEED Gold certification for a Green Lance
Rick Sheridan: Branch, Green Lake Branch. We hired both a cybersecurity analyst and
Rick Sheridan: an environment and security services manager to help us in those areas of both
Rick Sheridan: cybersecurity and security, physical security of the library system.
Rick Sheridan: We launched a mobile app that had 25, 000 downloads in the Apple app and Google
Rick Sheridan: Play stores. And then we did a lot of the preparatory
Rick Sheridan: work that was needed for the replacement of the integrated library system, the ILS,
Rick Sheridan: which is the technological backbone.
Rick Sheridan: for the library system. It's how we manage patron accounts.
Rick Sheridan: It's how people place holds. And we did a lot of work in 2025 to set
Rick Sheridan: us up for success in 2026, the year of implementation.
Rick Sheridan: So turning to what we're going to focus on in 2026,
Rick Sheridan: a lot of good work has already been accomplished or is moving forward in this
Rick Sheridan: space.
Rick Sheridan: Andee Walton, who's our new security manager,
Rick Sheridan: is already deep into a security audit, going to each location,
Rick Sheridan: physical location of the library system to understand the needs and interest of
Rick Sheridan: staff and patrons in those spaces. We've upgraded physical security tools.
Rick Sheridan: Early this year in the first quarter, we replaced the camera system here at the
Rick Sheridan: Central Library.
Rick Sheridan: And we're looking at ways to improve the electronic control system the library
Rick Sheridan: system has that manages access to our branches. And then of course,
Rick Sheridan: we're doing additional training for security staff.
Rick Sheridan: Our cybersecurity analyst has done great work in adding new tools to protect the
Rick Sheridan: library system and new processes and procedures for the library system to make
Rick Sheridan: sure that we are keeping
Rick Sheridan: the library's technology safe, patron information,
Rick Sheridan: staff information safe to ward off against any potential future cyber
Rick Sheridan: threats, because that sort of issue is only
Rick Sheridan: growing in terms of the threat to entities like the library system.
Rick Sheridan: So we want to make sure that we're well positioned and UV is doing great work in
Rick Sheridan: that space.
Rick Sheridan: And then lastly, we are well on track to launch at the end
Rick Sheridan: of Q2, if not the beginning of Q3, the new integrated library system,
Rick Sheridan: the new backbone Polaris for Seattle Public Library to make sure that we can
Rick Sheridan: effectively serve both the public and staff with a technological platform
Rick Sheridan: that makes our job easier and provides more services to the public.
Rick Sheridan: So the last thing I touch upon just in terms of the strategic plan for 2026,
Rick Sheridan: we're already starting to think about 2027 and to understand what we need to do
Rick Sheridan: to sort of to set goals and to continue progress against our 10-year strategic
Rick Sheridan: plan. We've done some work internally to ensure
Rick Sheridan: that there's alignment between strategic planning work and our budgeting process,
Rick Sheridan: such that
Rick Sheridan: The items that are highlighted in our plan are effectively funded,
Rick Sheridan: whether it be via private or public dollars.
Rick Sheridan: But we are waiting on some critical external funding decisions that really
Rick Sheridan: will help us understand the resources that are available to us as a library
Rick Sheridan: system. And so the voter consideration of the
Rick Sheridan: replacement library levy, which occurs in August,
Rick Sheridan: we'll wait to see what the voters' determination is on that in terms of
Rick Sheridan: that funding resource, but also we need to ensure that we
Rick Sheridan: understand the mayor's priorities in terms of her budget and what is actually
Rick Sheridan: transmitted to the city council come September.
Rick Sheridan: And so our planning work for 2027 is getting underway,
Rick Sheridan: but we want to be cognizant of those budget concerns that exist within
Rick Sheridan: decisions that are in the hands of parties like voters or
Rick Sheridan: the mayor and the city council.
Rick Sheridan: And with that, I'll pause to answer any questions.
Yazmin Mehdi: Thank you, Rick. That was a thorough report and I really
Yazmin Mehdi: appreciated you sharing both what the accomplishments were last year and then
Yazmin Mehdi: sort of how you how the library is building upon those accomplishments and
Yazmin Mehdi: moving further forward. Before I ask any questions,
Yazmin Mehdi: I'd like to see if my colleagues have questions. And Ron,
Yazmin Mehdi: For some reason, you show up on a separate page for me,
Yazmin Mehdi: so can you just unmute if you have questions?
Ron Chew: Yeah, can you, I mean, I'm hearing everything.
Ron Chew: Can you see me or what's?
Yazmin Mehdi: Ah, now you appeared because you began
Yazmin Mehdi: speaking. Yay. Yes, I can see you now. Did you have questions?
Ron Chew: Okay.
Ron Chew: Okay, great.
Ron Chew: I actually had a question which related to another hat I'm wearing,
Ron Chew: which is the AARP, aging senior, vision issues beginning.
Ron Chew: And I know I've brought it up with Tom as well.
Ron Chew: Have you guys thought about some, you know, maybe...
Ron Chew: kind of walk audit through the central and the branches just to see, you know,
Ron Chew: I know one of my pet peeves, ever since the development of the central
Ron Chew: branches, that floor where we have our meetings,
Ron Chew: that has the
Ron Chew: red colored walls. It's very, very...
Ron Chew: disorienting and actually potentially dangerous. I know even for me,
Ron Chew: because I trip and I don't know where the walls end and again,
Ron Chew: and where the floor and the, you know, so has that been thought about at all in
Ron Chew: terms of just that age-friendly navigation of
Ron Chew: The facilities.
Tom Fay: Yeah, I think we're beginning to look at things,
Ron Chew: Cool.
Tom Fay: all of those things, like the all ability needs in a number of
Tom Fay: ways as we redesign spaces. The red floor has been something people
Yazmin Mehdi: And.
Tom Fay: love and something people hate. And to your point, those with vision
Tom Fay: issues really have a struggle in there. It is something that I think we will have
Tom Fay: to address, even if that's to change the floor to a
Tom Fay: different color to at least provide some kind of sense of what the space is.
Tom Fay: That's something we'll have to look at over time.
Tom Fay: The other one that has come to me recently from
Tom Fay: Several patrons that have made inquiries is, can we do something with...
Tom Fay: new types of signage that is audible signage.
Tom Fay: Because we had a couple of people write in and they said, you know,
Yazmin Mehdi: Mm.
Tom Fay: a lot of people don't learn Braille anymore.
Tom Fay: They want to be more self-reliant in space without, you know,
Tom Fay: assistance from staff or LEED staff or
Tom Fay: or library staff in general. And so I've actually had our capital
Tom Fay: improvement folks taking a look at what those costs are for those type of
Tom Fay: technologies. That would be something that could be
Tom Fay: used not only in central, but also in branches. So yes,
Tom Fay: trying to where we can take advantage of new technologies and also understand the
Tom Fay: need of patrons better. When we inquired a little deeper with the
Tom Fay: patrons that had put forward this information,
Tom Fay: one of the things that we were hearing was that it, you know,
Tom Fay: current way of doing it just doesn't allow them to be self-reliant in the
Tom Fay: space.
Ron Chew: Yeah, no, thank you. Those are wonderful ways to look at
Ron Chew: tweaks that could help. And I'm mindful, obviously, as well,
Ron Chew: there are costs involved, but there may be some low-cost solutions
Ron Chew: on that issue with the colored walls and floor.
Ron Chew: Maybe there's some some way to keep the aesthetic.
Ron Chew: piece that people would like, but then accommodate some of us who have
Ron Chew: physical issues.
Ron Chew: Thank you.
Yazmin Mehdi: Yeah, Ron, I think that's a good point. And, you know,
Yazmin Mehdi: one of the things that I'm grateful for is one of the city council members,
Yazmin Mehdi: and I should remember who, it was either Dion Foster or Dan Strauss
Yazmin Mehdi: or Alexis Mercedes Rink added funding to the mayor's package.
Yazmin Mehdi: for the levy that would give money to, you know,
Yazmin Mehdi: make changes and fixes to the Central Library. So,
Yazmin Mehdi: that's a possibility in the future, potentially.
Ron Chew: Yeah. Yeah. Well, one thing, you know, I'm pushing a city on this issue of even
Ron Chew: the sidewalks, because, you know, we have these nice bike lanes and that
Tom Fay: IT.
Ron Chew: helps address the needs of 1 demographic. But, you know,
Yazmin Mehdi: Yeah.
Ron Chew: we've had a lot of sidewalks that are buckling with these tree roots. And
Ron Chew: it's caused a real hazard for us older adults who one fall, you're away from,
Ron Chew: you know, reduced mobility for the rest of your
Ron Chew: life. So hopefully we can keep that balance and
Ron Chew: keep pushing that everyone can be accommodated.
Yazmin Mehdi: Yeah, thanks, Ron. Appreciate your role on AARP to help with
Yazmin Mehdi: that nationwide. Faith, I see your hand.
Faith Pettis: Yeah, and I apologies if we talked about this
Faith Pettis: before, because I know we've talked about the
Faith Pettis: integrated library system that's coming in.
Faith Pettis: Can you remind us what sort of impact will that have on the normal library
Faith Pettis: customer coming in? Will they see a difference in?
Tom Fay: They want.
Faith Pettis: screen that they log into or what an impact.
Tom Fay: So it'll be, there'll be an impact in the sense of the
Yazmin Mehdi: Yeah.
Tom Fay: cutover, right? There will be some downtime for that
Tom Fay: cutover. And yes, and so we have a technology that allow us
Faith Pettis: Remember that, yep.
Tom Fay: to, you know, keep track of that. People still be able to check out and all
Tom Fay: that. Where we will have the greatest impact
Tom Fay: will be on.
Tom Fay: requesting old material. So as we do this, the underlying piece, the ILS changes,
Tom Fay: but then the BiblioCommons piece, the piece that people are used to seeing,
Tom Fay: has to be integrated in with that new ILS. That will take a little bit more time.
Tom Fay: The time has not yet been fully determined and how long that might take.
Tom Fay: but we'll have more details as we get into the August timeframe.
Tom Fay: And then as far as what people will see initially in the phase one,
Tom Fay: probably not a lot in the sense of what they will see initially,
Tom Fay: but as we move into secondary phases of this,
Tom Fay: as we can bring in new self-check systems,
Tom Fay: other technologies that allow you to actually use your phone for a checkout
Faith Pettis: Bo.
Tom Fay: device versus using a self-check machine. All of those things will come in as we
Tom Fay: move through and make sure the system is stable. I mean,
Tom Fay: one of the critical things, I think, is everyone knows with any kind of major
Tom Fay: systems migration is that you want
Tom Fay: you know, that 90 day to 120 day stability first,
Tom Fay: and then you can start looking at what else new you might bring in.
Tom Fay: The beauty about these processes is the staff and the IT teams have done a lot of
Tom Fay: work on our business workflows, not only from the library perspective,
Tom Fay: but what other workflows may be integrated at some point.
Tom Fay: And so all of that work has already been done in many ways and will allow us to
Tom Fay: leverage the new system better as we move forward.
Tom Fay: So much more to come on the ILS front. For the first time in 20 some odd years,
Tom Fay: we actually will have the ability to do some different types of potential
Tom Fay: business integrations if
Tom Fay: If so, if we choose to, and also to introduce some new
Tom Fay: technologies that we haven't been able to.
Yazmin Mehdi: Great. Thanks, Tom. Any other questions?
Yazmin Mehdi: The thing I want to underscore here with this report is that the library, you know,
Yazmin Mehdi: took time to put together a strategic plan that really incorporated feedback
Yazmin Mehdi: from the community. We set these six impact areas.
Yazmin Mehdi: And, you know, I'm really proud of the work that the
Yazmin Mehdi: library staff are doing to track this work,
Yazmin Mehdi: to report back regularly to the public on what's being delivered.
Yazmin Mehdi: And the thing that's really most impressive to me is that we set these
Yazmin Mehdi: goals and we're just meeting them one after the other.
Yazmin Mehdi: And so it's just, it's easy for the library board to really
Yazmin Mehdi: just underscore that this amazing work is happening and it's wonderful to be able
Yazmin Mehdi: to report all the progress being made. So thank you, Rick. Regards to Jessica,
Yazmin Mehdi: who I know is key.
Yazmin Mehdi: to getting this, tracking this work and making sure it
Yazmin Mehdi: gets done and it gets reported.
Rick Sheridan: Thank you.
Yazmin Mehdi: Okay, thanks, Rick. So let's move on to old business.
Yazmin Mehdi: And this old business is Chief Librarian Performance Review and Compensation.
Yazmin Mehdi: And so what I would like to do is just quick give a little bit of a preamble for
Yazmin Mehdi: what we're talking about.
Yazmin Mehdi: Um, so...
Yazmin Mehdi: What I'd like to do is return us to the April board meeting where we conducted
Yazmin Mehdi: Tom's performance evaluation in executive session.
Yazmin Mehdi: After looking at the meeting minutes from April,
Yazmin Mehdi: I realized that we didn't share in the public session Tom's accomplishments that
Yazmin Mehdi: led to our decision to award him additional leave and a pay increase.
Yazmin Mehdi: In part, this was because the meeting had already
Yazmin Mehdi: gone over the normal time limit, but it was a miss on my part,
Yazmin Mehdi: so I'd like to make up for that now. Tom accomplished a great deal in the last
Yazmin Mehdi: few years, and the list of his accomplishments goes
Yazmin Mehdi: over several pages.
Yazmin Mehdi: Among the most salient, however, are these.
Yazmin Mehdi: He successfully advocated for new sources of federal and state funding,
Yazmin Mehdi: specifically a $1. 4 million federal earmark, $5.
Yazmin Mehdi: 8 million FEMA grant,
Yazmin Mehdi: and a $1.8 million state commerce grant. And each of these was the first of its
Yazmin Mehdi: kind, and hopefully not the last, Tom. He advanced statewide and national e-book
Yazmin Mehdi: licensing cost remediation and advocacy efforts.
Yazmin Mehdi: We heard a little bit about that earlier.
Yazmin Mehdi: If ultimately successful, this work will reduce the cost of e-book
Yazmin Mehdi: and audio books for libraries, which I don't have to tell anyone on this
Yazmin Mehdi: call would have a significant impact on our collections budget. Just a reminder,
Yazmin Mehdi: those books cost, or those formats, cost three to five times what a print
Yazmin Mehdi: book costs.
Yazmin Mehdi: He successfully ensured the library recovered from the 2024 ransomware attack.
Yazmin Mehdi: He restored open hours to pre-pandemic levels. He completed 2 retrofits for,
Yazmin Mehdi: wait, I wrote URM, that's right, unreinforced masonry buildings,
Yazmin Mehdi: our branch libraries. He completed a new automated materials
Yazmin Mehdi: handling system.
Yazmin Mehdi: and he completed a new library app. Obviously, Tom did not do this work alone.
Yazmin Mehdi: So thank you. This is a moment to say also thank you to
Yazmin Mehdi: library staff for their work on these accomplishments.
Yazmin Mehdi: But Tom is the one who made sure these things happened.
Yazmin Mehdi: Lastly, we were not clear that Tom's pay raise is
Yazmin Mehdi: retroactive to December 31st, 2025, which is the date that other library
Yazmin Mehdi: staff received their annual wage increases. So I'd like
Tom Fay: I'm sorry, I hit dinner. It was 20.
Yazmin Mehdi: 2025.
Tom Fay: 2025, correct? Okay, thank you.
Yazmin Mehdi: Last day of, it's the very last day of 2025.
Yazmin Mehdi: So I'd like to request a motion to clarify this.
Yazmin Mehdi: Can I hear a motion to make Tom's pay raise as approved at the April board
Yazmin Mehdi: meeting retroactive to December 31st, 2025?
Faith Pettis: I'll make that motion.
Ron Chew: Second.
Bendixen, Carmen: Second.
Yazmin Mehdi: Great. All in favor, please say I.
Bendixen, Carmen: I...
Ron Chew: Kai.
Faith Pettis: I.
Yazmin Mehdi: Okay, that motion passes unanimously. Thank you, colleagues,
Yazmin Mehdi: and for your forbearance. And I apologize that we had to come back
Yazmin Mehdi: and fix that miss on my part. Okay, so now we can go on to new business.
Yazmin Mehdi: And 1st is the staff systems accessible
Yazmin Mehdi: Sorry, acceptable use policy introduction.
Tom Fay: All right, for that, I believe we're going to be bringing Rob
Tom Fay: Gannon up and Charles Wesley, or maybe just Charles.
Tom Fay: I'm not sure who's introducing it. Charles, are you introducing?
Charles Wesley: I am happy to do so. I see Rob is on the call, but yeah,
Charles Wesley: I'm happy to lead the discussion.
Tom Fay: Alright, take it away.
Charles Wesley: All right, so I have included in this packet a memo
Charles Wesley: briefing on the staff systems acceptable use policy.
Charles Wesley: This is a policy that we are internally working on that we would like to bring to
Charles Wesley: your consideration in a future board meeting for approval.
Charles Wesley: But today is an opportunity just to give you an overview of what this is,
Charles Wesley: why it will be important and useful policy for the library,
Charles Wesley: and what it will cover. And then also have an opportunity just to
Charles Wesley: ask some, or give you an opportunity to ask some
Charles Wesley: questions.
Charles Wesley: just so we all understand kind of what this is about.
Charles Wesley: This is a continuation of a lot of the work that we have been doing in the IT
Charles Wesley: department broadly to address the overall operational needs and priorities of the
Charles Wesley: organization and also to increase our security presence.
Charles Wesley: So this policy is in the context of both policy and security.
Charles Wesley: The National Institute of Standards and Framework, or NIST,
Charles Wesley: has a cybersecurity framework, or CSF, which is a very industry standard way of
Charles Wesley: understanding
Charles Wesley: how organizations can holistically address cybersecurity.
Charles Wesley: And there are six different pillars in that framework. There's A govern,
Charles Wesley: identity, protect, detect, respond, and recovery pillar.
Charles Wesley: And each of them have strategic and tactical strategies you can deploy
Charles Wesley: to cover all of those bases. So policies is in the govern framework
Charles Wesley: and realistically from a practical standpoint,
Charles Wesley: you can have policy controls and technical controls.
Charles Wesley: So just to kind of illustrate the difference of technical control is like
Charles Wesley: a restriction that doesn't allow you to share a social security number document
Charles Wesley: to the public. So that's a technical control that would
Charles Wesley: prevent you from doing something. A policy control is really articulating
Charles Wesley: that it is the policy of the library to only share information appropriately and
Charles Wesley: just make it really clear for folks kind of what the rules are.
Charles Wesley: So a technical control is
Charles Wesley: an enforcement mechanism of a policy.
Charles Wesley: Historically, the library has addressed a lot of these
Charles Wesley: issues across multiple policies, the student or the employee handbook,
Charles Wesley: and then there's also the broader acceptable use policy that applies to
Charles Wesley: city staff generally. But as we have been increasing our
Charles Wesley: maturity around some of the technical controls, having a
Charles Wesley: dedicated library specific staff acceptable use policy that clearly
Charles Wesley: articulates all of these things in one place is a logical next step just to
Charles Wesley: provide more clarity. So our intent really is to is to provide
Charles Wesley: that in a policy that then can make it just.
Charles Wesley: more clear and easy to understand for staff what the expectations are,
Charles Wesley: both in terms of how they can operate safely and within the policy and some
Charles Wesley: specific examples of things or uses of technology that fall outside of approved
Charles Wesley: uses. So a little further down in the memo,
Charles Wesley: I list a couple of kind of categories.
Charles Wesley: That would fall into that. So it has everything related to who the
Charles Wesley: policy applies to. So that's a really key foundational one
Charles Wesley: that this is about staff use. A future policy around patron use of
Charles Wesley: technology will be coming, but this is just going to focus on staff
Charles Wesley: to start.
Charles Wesley: And it will talk about how technology resources can be used,
Charles Wesley: how library information can be used or shared,
Charles Wesley: particularly confidential information about patrons or staff,
Charles Wesley: how we're going to monitor systems for unauthorized or compromised use.
Charles Wesley: So detect is one of the pillars in
Charles Wesley: the NIST CSF and so being able to detect an attack requires that you be looking
Charles Wesley: for monitoring unusual activity. So it will talk about how that is going
Charles Wesley: to work. It'll talk a little bit about how devices
Charles Wesley: are used, so library issues, laptops, phones, those types of things.
Charles Wesley: So it will set.
Charles Wesley: expectations around how those should be used and also about how, you know,
Charles Wesley: staff will have an expectation to not circumvent or otherwise kind of get
Charles Wesley: around these types of controls. So more to come in the subsequent
Charles Wesley: weeks and months as we put this policy together.
Charles Wesley: But that's really where we're coming from. The other primary thing I would just
Charles Wesley: highlight is that the policy will be at the policy level,
Charles Wesley: and there will be a companion acceptable use standard,
Charles Wesley: which will have a lot more operational detail.
Charles Wesley: And the intent is that the policy will establish
Charles Wesley: the priorities and kind of main objectives of technology use,
Charles Wesley: and then the standard will get into much more granular detail that will evolve
Charles Wesley: over time as our tools and systems change. So those level of details would be
Charles Wesley: delegated to the standard, and all of those changes wouldn't have to
Charles Wesley: come back to this group, but the policy would really set the
Charles Wesley: policy.
Charles Wesley: guardrails that everything else would operate within.
Charles Wesley: Um...
Charles Wesley: I'll pause there. I think that kind of covers the broad
Charles Wesley: gist of it. But if you have any comments or questions
Charles Wesley: or anything I can elaborate on, I'm happy to do so. Or Rob,
Charles Wesley: if you have anything to add.
Yazmin Mehdi: Rob anything from you.
Rob Gannon: I have nothing to add at this point, but I'm happy to also answer questions if
Rob Gannon: they come up.
Yazmin Mehdi: Great. Colleagues, what questions do you have?
Yazmin Mehdi: Okay, I can start.
Yazmin Mehdi: So the idea of limited personal use is one that when I worked for the budget
Yazmin Mehdi: office, I was part of a data processing standards
Yazmin Mehdi: team, and that was the language that we used.
Yazmin Mehdi: And so that elicited for me
Yazmin Mehdi: What, I'm assuming, Charles and Rob, that you're looking at whatever
Yazmin Mehdi: equivalent policy the city has for this topic. Great. Okay, I just saw a head nod.
Yazmin Mehdi: That's all I need. Yeah, as I read through your draft policy,
Yazmin Mehdi: I was like, well, wait, what's the standard? And of course,
Yazmin Mehdi: what you're saying is you haven't developed that yet.
Yazmin Mehdi: So that will be interesting for us to look at. But I hear what you just said,
Yazmin Mehdi: which is that the board needs to look at the policy level.
Yazmin Mehdi: The standard itself will be set at the staff level. Is that right? Okay. Okay.
Charles Wesley: Correct.
Yazmin Mehdi: The other thing, a couple of sections that I highlighted,
Yazmin Mehdi: which I'll just, we don't have to necessarily talk about
Yazmin Mehdi: it here, but I'll be curious when you come back
Yazmin Mehdi: with a final version for you to talk more about this no reasonable expectation of
Yazmin Mehdi: privacy.
Charles Wesley: Mhm.
Yazmin Mehdi: That is definitely language that I recall from when I worked for the city that no
Yazmin Mehdi: one should have an expectation of privacy. But, you know, I'm curious, like,
Yazmin Mehdi: has that language been updated in any way? And again,
Yazmin Mehdi: you don't have to answer it now, Charles.
Yazmin Mehdi: Um...
Yazmin Mehdi: The other thing that I wanted to underscore is this point about
Yazmin Mehdi: confidentiality, that employees should be aware that
Yazmin Mehdi: significant categories of information held by the library about them are
Yazmin Mehdi: legally exempt from disclosure under the Public Record Act,
Yazmin Mehdi: including personnel records and financial information.
Yazmin Mehdi: So library employees should feel confident that the Public Record Act does
Yazmin Mehdi: allow that to be exempt, that kind of detail.
Yazmin Mehdi: And then the other thing I would just suggest for future when you come back is
Yazmin Mehdi: As you, like when I looked at the smartphone and
Yazmin Mehdi: mobile device section, could you, when you come back,
Yazmin Mehdi: share instances of problematic uses from the past?
Yazmin Mehdi: to test the policy and make sure that the policy is covering those problematic uses.
Charles Wesley: Mhm.
Yazmin Mehdi: That would be that would be helpful to me. And then the other thing that...
Yazmin Mehdi: Under specific prohibitions and limitations, the first two items are,
Yazmin Mehdi: you know, the library expressly prohibits
Yazmin Mehdi: activities including, but not limited to, one, conducting a private business, two,
Yazmin Mehdi: political campaigning.
Yazmin Mehdi: And like part of me is like, I hope this isn't the first policy that
Yazmin Mehdi: these two things are listed in. Because in a way,
Yazmin Mehdi: I hope it's self-evident to library employees that they should not be
Yazmin Mehdi: conducting a private business or politically campaigning. So anyway,
Yazmin Mehdi: that's a curiosity. I'm kind of hoping that's not.
Yazmin Mehdi: This is not the first policy where those two things expressly prohibited appear.
Charles Wesley: Thank you. I've taken notes on all of those and we
Charles Wesley: will definitely address those in a future meeting. Our intent is to,
Charles Wesley: so we are collecting some internal feedback as well on that draft and I
Charles Wesley: expect that we'll be able to share that draft in the next board packet.
Charles Wesley: Just a couple of super high level comments. We are
Charles Wesley: aligning our draft policy with both the city policy and just generally best
Charles Wesley: practices. So some of the things that you'll see
Charles Wesley: will look familiar because they kind of are standard. And as I mentioned earlier,
Charles Wesley: other policies or like the employee handbook, for example,
Charles Wesley: touch on some of these. So in most cases,
Charles Wesley: there likely is some language somewhere that speaks to that. So in some cases,
Charles Wesley: we're just consolidating things that are already said in other places into one
Charles Wesley: place. So you can kind of do a top to bottom
Charles Wesley: look. And for other things like political
Charles Wesley: campaigning, for example, coming up into the levy season, you know,
Charles Wesley: the city folks have come to the library to remind folks about what is and is not
Charles Wesley: permissible. So I think there
Charles Wesley: There is information about that generally available to folks, but again,
Charles Wesley: just explicitly and clearly stating it in the policy. So that way,
Charles Wesley: there's no confusion or misunderstandings around how these things apply as part of
Charles Wesley: the intent. But there will be some things that are
Yazmin Mehdi: Yeah.
Charles Wesley: new in the policy that
Charles Wesley: you know, maybe are more specific than has ever
Charles Wesley: been previously commented on. So there'll be a mix of new and old.
Yazmin Mehdi: And that makes perfect sense to me, Charles.
Yazmin Mehdi: Like you wouldn't be bringing us a policy that had nothing new because what would
Charles Wesley: Yeah.
Yazmin Mehdi: be the point? But one thing that might be useful,
Yazmin Mehdi: just so that in the probably completely impossible situation where
Yazmin Mehdi: a member of the public is reading this policy and saying, wait,
Charles Wesley: Mm.
Yazmin Mehdi: is this the only place where it tells employees they can't do these two things?
Yazmin Mehdi: Maybe you could just cross-reference the employee handbook.
Charles Wesley: Mm.
Charles Wesley: Yep.
Yazmin Mehdi: as a way for people to understand.
Tom Fay: Yeah, and there are some other areas too. There's the city's ethics policy,
Tom Fay: which talks about some of these things around campaigning, etc.
Tom Fay: So there are multiples in here, and we'll make sure they're referenced in
Yazmin Mehdi: Yeah, and sorry.
Tom Fay: the document. Some of them already, some of them already are other areas in
Tom Fay: the library's policies.
Yazmin Mehdi: Okay, and then the, sorry, I did have one more thing and then I saw
Yazmin Mehdi: Faith. The section about potential conflicts
Yazmin Mehdi: with the collective bargaining agreement, I'll just be curious to know if you have
Yazmin Mehdi: an example of that where the CBA would supersede this policy.
Charles Wesley: Okay.
Yazmin Mehdi: So if you would just think about that and come back, and maybe you don't have any,
Yazmin Mehdi: and it's just important to have this language, but I'm just, I'm curious.
Yazmin Mehdi: Faith, over to you.
Faith Pettis: Yeah, and this one also isn't for answering
Faith Pettis: right now. It's just that as we're working through
Tom Fay: Pass.
Faith Pettis: this and thinking about it, I would love to see the patron policy as
Faith Pettis: a side, kind of a side by side, just to see where the differences are.
Faith Pettis: So for my own education, I know it was referenced in here,
Faith Pettis: but if someone could send it out, that would be great.
Charles Wesley: Kate.
Yazmin Mehdi: And I think you said that you're expecting to develop that after this
Charles Wesley: Good.
Yazmin Mehdi: policy. Is that right?
Charles Wesley: So yeah, there are some existing, like the end user agreement type things
Charles Wesley: that speak to like what patrons can do, but what we would be bringing forward
Charles Wesley: again would be a more complete policy so that it wouldn't be kind of spread across
Charles Wesley: a couple of different
Charles Wesley: area. So I can definitely supply what we have
Charles Wesley: existing around what patrons expectations around technology are,
Charles Wesley: and that that will inform the patron policy. I can just say at a high level,
Charles Wesley: the primary distinction between the two is that the
Charles Wesley: commitment to, you know, privacy and intellectual freedom for
Charles Wesley: patrons is a core function of the library, and that is distinct from the
Charles Wesley: expectations of someone who works at the library, and they are different.
Charles Wesley: And so ensuring that we're making it clear around how
Charles Wesley: those two uses differ, those two types of user differ.
Charles Wesley: And then also on the patron side, again, going back to our security controls,
Charles Wesley: circumventing, you know, cybersecurity controls or using, you know,
Charles Wesley: technology for, you know, hacking or something like that.
Charles Wesley: Those are types of things that would be in both.
Charles Wesley: So...
Faith Pettis: That's really helpful. Thank you.
Charles Wesley: Mm-hmm.
Yazmin Mehdi: Okay, any final questions for Charles or Rob?
Yazmin Mehdi: Okay, seeing none, Charles and Rob, thanks again for remarkable work.
Yazmin Mehdi: You guys get a lot done in your work day. We really appreciate you.
Charles Wesley: Thank you all.
Yazmin Mehdi: Okay, so going on, normally we would bring Jesse Lucas in to
Yazmin Mehdi: talk to us about her union report. Jesse is on vacation and sends her
Yazmin Mehdi: regrets. So, and her backups from the union are also
Yazmin Mehdi: unable to attend.
Yazmin Mehdi: So Jesse's report will stand as written. I'd just like to note that it was really
Yazmin Mehdi: wonderful to hire that, you know, things seem like they're on an upward
Yazmin Mehdi: trajectory in terms of working with the union. And I'm really,
Yazmin Mehdi: really happy to hire that.
Yazmin Mehdi: And then next we would have reports from the foundation and the friends.
Yazmin Mehdi: I know there was no foundation meeting in the last month. So Ron,
Yazmin Mehdi: you're not nodding, but I'm assuming that's right. Okay.
Ron Chew: Yeah, yeah, there was there was no meeting.
Ron Chew: I just did want to mention I had a great coffee discussion with Sarah Stanley,
Ron Chew: who was head of the foundation board and we talked very optimistically about,
Ron Chew: you know,
Ron Chew: efforts to recruit new board members to increase the diversity,
Tom Fay: S.
Ron Chew: and then to pair fundraising efforts with obviously the levy bond measure,
Ron Chew: assuming that passes, so they have momentum on both fronts.
Ron Chew: Resources come from both fronts. So
Ron Chew: It was fun, yeah.
Yazmin Mehdi: Great. So even on an off month, Ron, you're off meeting with foundation
Yazmin Mehdi: members. I love to hear that. Faith, over to you on a report from the Friends.
Ron Chew: Kai.
Faith Pettis: Yes, happy to report. And our friends at the Friends are busy
Faith Pettis: as usual. They attended the Seattle Storms Black
Faith Pettis: Excellence Game on Friday, June 12th and gave away 500 tri-branded
Faith Pettis: totes in 50 minutes to game attendees. So they really enjoyed doing that.
Yazmin Mehdi: Wow.
Faith Pettis: And then at the end of June, they also had a couple of events,
Faith Pettis: one passed and one to come. They did the Juneteenth celebrations at
Faith Pettis: Jenkins Park, and then they're doing their pride
Faith Pettis: celebrations on Capitol Hill. Those are their two biggest events of the
Faith Pettis: year. They expect in total to give away 2000
Faith Pettis: totes and 2000 books at those two events, which is fantastic.
Faith Pettis: The other thing they raised is they do have board positions coming up and there
Faith Pettis: are four open positions that will be available in the fall.
Faith Pettis: So they are seeking board members and applications are on their website.
Faith Pettis: So round up your friends. And then finally, the
Faith Pettis: Next board meeting on July 21st will be held in person in Ballard following the
Faith Pettis: foundation event that I think is happening at the Rubens Brews there.
Faith Pettis: So I'm looking forward to attending that one in person.
Yazmin Mehdi: Wow.
Faith Pettis: All I've got.
Yazmin Mehdi: That's so great. In-person meetings, post-pandemic. Yay. Something we,
Faith Pettis: Yeah, right.
Yazmin Mehdi: by the way, are considering for the not too distant
Yazmin Mehdi: future. So stay tuned, board members. Any other updates from library board
Yazmin Mehdi: members?
Ron Chew: Can I?
Ron Chew: Just mentioned, I was in Spokane and I mentioned this to
Ron Chew: Tom already, meeting with his counterpart at the
Ron Chew: Spokane Public Library. And by the way, he has such high regard for Tom and all
Ron Chew: of his work. Seems like every library I go to,
Ron Chew: Tom is sort of like...
Ron Chew: The subject of our conversation for the first five, 10 minutes,
Ron Chew: and then the rest is the other stuff. But
Ron Chew: I was there for ARP meeting, Spokane chapter,
Ron Chew: and I visited the library. They're doing amazing stuff there.
Ron Chew: But part of the conversation was around this issue of the immaterial pricing.
Ron Chew: I've been looped into a friend of mine is
Ron Chew: who Tom knows well, Jenny Pugh, she's director of the Hoboken Public
Ron Chew: Library, and she's been on this task force looking
Ron Chew: at that whole issue of e-book, audiobook pricing,
Ron Chew: which I know has come up many times at our meetings.
Ron Chew: So what I'm trying to do actually,
Ron Chew: with ARP and we've got support from the state ARP,
Ron Chew: we're trying to bring it to a national level that we can be an ally in pushing
Ron Chew: for this because it affects older adults who it increases their ability to access
Ron Chew: materials.
Ron Chew: And so.
Ron Chew: I'm hopeful that we can hopefully be allies,
Ron Chew: ALA and then AARP at some juncture. I have some national conversations coming
Ron Chew: up. So
Ron Chew: Appreciate Tom bringing this up at all of our meetings and the financial impact
Ron Chew: because it's huge. So just to share that.
Tom Fay: Yeah, and thanks, Ron. I'm glad you brought it up.
Tom Fay: It's one of the things I'll be talking about when I go back to ALA.
Tom Fay: I'm meeting with Steve Potash, who's now the...
Tom Fay: President of the board of directors for OverDrive.
Tom Fay: There'll be a new CEO was announced as well.
Tom Fay: We'll be meeting with them at ALA and they've just announced some things that
Tom Fay: are going to be some, hopefully some positive changes with at
Tom Fay: least two of the big five. So more to come on that after I have some
Tom Fay: discussions back in Chicago. Jenny has been doing a great job as you
Tom Fay: ULC and really pushing and promoting this, PLA as well.
Tom Fay: So a lot of folks working on it. I know there's been a lot of work
Tom Fay: individually at various state levels. And I think, you know,
Tom Fay: one of the things we've been focused on at ULC is that this really has to have
Tom Fay: national push. State efforts are good. It stirs up the nest.
Tom Fay: so to speak, but at the end of the day, it needs to be something that is covering
Tom Fay: the entire country, not just pockets. So as I get more information,
Tom Fay: I'll be happy to share all that with you, but some positive steps here this week.
Ron Chew: Yeah, and I might just add, I have a meeting with the AARP National
Ron Chew: Advocacy and Policy person in about a week or two.
Ron Chew: And they have a pretty set agenda in terms of top priorities.
Ron Chew: So my state director says, we've got it up the chain now. So there's
Ron Chew: possibility it can be added to, you know, the docket in terms of, you know, privacy,
Ron Chew: very insurance, Social Security and Medicare,
Ron Chew: family caregiver, but if we can push that up to that level,
Ron Chew: it'll be great.
Tom Fay: Absolutely. Thank you.
Ron Chew: Yeah, thank you.
Yazmin Mehdi: Yeah, Ron, that's astounding. It would be wonderful to have AARP's help
Yazmin Mehdi: with this. And, you know, another opportunity here to say,
Yazmin Mehdi: as you noted, Tom is well regarded among his colleagues,
Yazmin Mehdi: but like this work that Tom is doing will have a nationwide impact.
Yazmin Mehdi: And again, it's not just Tom, it's Tom, it's Kiersten, it's Rick.
Yazmin Mehdi: But this is going to have a nationwide impact.
Yazmin Mehdi: It will help people across the country if libraries don't have to pay three to five
Tom Fay: Okay.
Yazmin Mehdi: times more for e-books and audiobooks. And
Yazmin Mehdi: I just want to note, because in an old, older board meeting,
Yazmin Mehdi: I poo-pooed audio books. And I just want to say that recently I
Yazmin Mehdi: have been checking out audio books, forcing myself to say whether or not,
Yazmin Mehdi: why I was poo-pooing them in the past. And
Yazmin Mehdi: I have like doubled my intake of books, thanks to audio books. Yes,
Yazmin Mehdi: my colleagues are nodding their heads and saying, yes, where have you been?
Yazmin Mehdi: Because they're wonderful. Like I just read a memoir that was,
Yazmin Mehdi: it still feels weird to say read, but anyway, I read a memoir that was
Yazmin Mehdi: narrated by the author, and you just get these nuances from the
Yazmin Mehdi: author reading that you don't get if you're looking at the printed book.
Yazmin Mehdi: I'll never give up my printed books, but yeah, audiobooks are wonderful,
Yazmin Mehdi: and I'm sure e-books as well.
Tom Fay: Yeah.
Tom Fay: Yeah, thanks, Brad. And I, you know, I did a podcast recently and it was a
Tom Fay: younger group of podcasters, and they wanted me to settle their bet
Tom Fay: about e-audio versus what they call traditional reading. And I said, no,
Tom Fay: it's reading. And I think for folks,
Tom Fay: It really does provide an all abilities approach to reading,
Tom Fay: which I think most people can appreciate and have being someone right now that's
Tom Fay: listening to one that's a very complex science fiction book,
Tom Fay: I can assure you I have a whole different level of focus.
Tom Fay: And I think those are the things too. It brings in different
Tom Fay: census to the equation and the experience of reading and activates the mind in a
Tom Fay: different way. So a lot of positives with the audio as
Tom Fay: well.
Yazmin Mehdi: Yeah, absolutely. I have a friend who listens to audio
Ron Chew: And.
Yazmin Mehdi: books on twice or three times speed. She discovered this as a 40 something
Yazmin Mehdi: year old and like astounding much. She has a superpower.
Yazmin Mehdi: I do not have that superpower.
Yazmin Mehdi: Anyway, sorry, we digress. We go on and on about audio books.
Yazmin Mehdi: But Ron, really wonderful to have AARP's help on
Yazmin Mehdi: that.
Yazmin Mehdi: Do I have any other comments or updates for my colleagues?
Yazmin Mehdi: In which case, it is now 1216 and this meeting is
Yazmin Mehdi: adjourned. We'll see you all in July.
Tom Fay: Thanks, all.
Yazmin Mehdi: Yeah.
Faith Pettis: Thanks, everyone.
Tom Fay: Yeah.
Bendixen, Carmen: Thank you.
Yazmin Mehdi: Thank you.