WAML General Business Meeting
Annual Conference 2018
Love Library
San Diego State University
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Friday, September 14, 2018
The meeting was presided over by Tom Brittnacher, President. The meeting was called to order at 1:05pm.
Tom Brittnacher opened the meeting with a presentation to Katherine Rankin of the Distinguished Service Award.
Board Reports
Julie Sweetkind-Singer gave a Summary of the Executive Board meeting that took place from approximately 10am until noon on September 12, 2018.
- The Board discussed the Policies and Procedures document at length including the current work of updating it and moving it from the wiki to Google Drive.
- The group agreed to present to the Membership changes to two Bylaws with voting occurring between October 1, 2018 and October 31, 2018.
- Members of the Board noted that there are different mission statements on the website and in the Information Bulletin. The Board wants this standardized and passed the following motion: The Executive Board will form a task force to create a mission statement for the organization. Phil White has agreed to chair the task force with Sierra Laddusaw as the second member. The group will produce a new mission statement that will be submitted to the Membership to amend the Bylaws in accordance with the rules by the 2019 Business Meeting.
- The Board decided it was in the organization’s interest to have a second signatory on all bank accounts. A motion was passed that starting July 1, 2018 and every third year thereafter, the President will appoint the new President-Elect as a secondary signatory to the Treasurer on the WAML bank account(s) for a term of three years that coincides with their term on the Executive Board.
- The Board heard reports from the other Board members, managers, editors and committee chairs, all detailed in the meeting notes below.
Committee and Manager Reports
Bruce Godfrey provided the Treasurer’s report. As of September 14, 2018, WAML has $20,188.60 in its checking and savings accounts. As of September 12, 2018, the income from the Annual Conference in San Diego was $997.10. Overall, the organization has had a net increase in its income for the calendar year of $613.48.
Jon Jablonski provided the Continuing Education Report. The committee planned and carried out a pre-conference workshop for the San Diego meeting on Online Map Indexes: Faster, Better Access to Map Sets and Aerial Photographs. The workshop was attended by nearly everyone attending the conference. Jon put out a call for new members and asked that a member of the committee (or a new member) take over the leadership role.
Susan Powell provided the Scholarship Committee report. The 2018 scholarship committee had 5 members including the previous year’s two winners (Taylor Hixson and Anita Martinez). There were 30 applicants for the two awards: Diversity and Early Career. The winners were Nicholas Beyelia, Librarian for History & Genealogy at the Los Angeles Public Library and Sarah Zhang, Reference Librarian at the Belzberg Library at Simon Fraser University in British Columbia, Canada. Over the course of awarding the scholarships it became clear that the award distinctions were not useful in choosing the winners and so two generic scholarships were awarded. For 2019, the group will reconsider the award categories and eligibility criteria. They also plan to look into creating an endowment for the two scholarships.
Sierra Laddusaw provided the Web Communications Committee report. The website has now been migrated to an updated, responsive version at the same URL: https://wamlorg.mytestingsite.com. News & Notes has been folded into the Information Bulletin. The Map Librarian’s Toolbox has be migrated to the MediaWiki platform: /toolbox. Three issues of the Information Bulletin were published in the last year with Issue 49, Volume 1 celebrating the 50th anniversary of the organization. The organizational Twitter account now has 235 followers.
Phil White provided the Nominating Committee report. The Committee was formed in March 2018 and successfully organized nominations for the election. The committee included Katie Lage, Kim Durante, Chris Thiry, and Phil White. Two Executive Board positions were up for election: Vice President/President-Elect and Secretary. Susan Powell was nominated for Vice President/President-Elect and ran unopposed. Kathy Stroud and Julie Sweetkind-Singer were nominated for Secretary. Julie Sweetkind-Singer was re-elected as Secretary.
Julie Sweetkind-Singer provided the Archivist report for Chris Salvano in his absence. There needs to be a formal Memo of Understanding between WAML and Stanford University to house the organization’s archives. The Executive Board will hold a special meeting with Chris Salvano and Kim Durante this fall to review all of the electronic materials that need to be submitted and to come up with a plan to move the archiving from a paper-based system to an electronic-based submission system.
Greg Armento provided the Membership Manager report. As of September 14, 2018 WAML had 83 members including 8 new and 10 lifetime memberships. Seventeen people did not renew from last year. Greg is working on strategies to welcome new members to the organization.
Lisa Lamont provided the Business Manager report. Lisa noted that only two copies of past Occasional Papers had been sold in the last year. She received a quote to digitize all of the WAML OP’s with the exception of OP14 for which they do not hold copyright and OPs 9 and 10 as they have been superseded. The Board asked Lisa to get an updated quote and move forward with scanning. She will work with Web committee to get the materials online and will come up with a communications strategy to publicize their availability. Chrissy Klenke will work with Julie Sweetkind-Singer to get DOIs minted for the books and they will be added to the Digital Archives.
Liaison Reports
Daniel Brendle-Moczuk emailed the Association of Canadian Map Libraries and Archives (ACMLA) report. CARTO-ACMLA recently held a joint conference with IASSIST and it was a great success and oversubscribed. Several WAML members attended in Montreal, Quebec. ACMLA members are currently voting on unofficially changing the name of ACMLA to CARTO-ACMLA as CARTO has map/geospatial connotations and its annual conference has used the name CARTO for a long time. ACMLA Executive is down to 3 executives (minimum as required by non-profit act) because so few folks volunteer to be on the Executive. Daniel Brendle-Moczuk is President, Marcel Fortin, from University of Toronto, Past-President, and Dan Jacubek, Ryerson University, Toronto, is Treasurer. Next year’s CARTO-ACMLA conference is at McMaster University, Hamilton, Ont.
Kathy Rankin provided the liaison report from the American Library Association, Map and Geospatial Information Round Table (ALA-MAGIRT). ALA Midwinter took place in Denver in early February. MAGIRT’s field trip was to the Earth Science and Map Library at University of Colorado, Boulder, followed by dinner at the Dushanbe Teahouse. The ALA annual conference took place in New Orleans in June. MAGIRT had a tour of the Louisiana Historical Center and a dinner at the Court of the Two Sisters. Paige Andrew was awarded the MAGIRT honors award at the dinner. MAGIRT hosted a panel discussion on Understanding and Using Spatial Humanities: Digital Mapping at the Forefront of Scholarly Research. The panelists were Kathleen Hart Weimer, Nicole Kong, and Chelcie Rowell. A memorial resolution honoring Mary Larsgaard, was approved at the ALCTS Council Meeting in New Orleans. In addition, Mary’s name was read aloud at a council meeting, along with other ALCTS/ALA members who passed away since the 2017 Annual Conference. Jon Jablonski and Paige Andrew helped Erin Stalberg, ALCTS Division Councilor and Susan Wynne, ALCTS CAMMS Representative to write the resolution. The new chair of MAGIRT is Tammy Wong from the Library of Congress Geography and Map Division. The newly elected officers are vice chair/chair elect Iris Taylor, also from LC G&M, and assistant treasurer Marguerite Ragnow from the University of Minnesota. Catherine Hodge from the University of Iowa stayed on for a second term as secretary. MAGIRT is going to make a proposal for the ALA Emerging Leaders program to have young librarians or library school students work on the new edition of the Guide to US Map Resources, which now has the title Online Guide to Map Collections. ALA no longer has tables for the roundtables and other groups in the exhibits area at conferences. They now have something called the ALA Lounge outside the exhibits area so that people have access to it all the hours of the conference and not just during the exhibit hours. MAGIRT is looking into taking part in it in order to reach out to potential members during upcoming conferences. For ALA members, the new space where members and groups can post information and have discussions is called ALA Connect, and MAGIRT has a public space on it: https://connect.ala.org/magirt/home ALA Midwinter will take place in Seattle January 25th-29th, 2019, and ALA Annual will take place in Washington, DC, on June 20th-25th. During Midwinter MAGIRT is planning a field trip to the University of Washington Libraries map collection and also possibly to the Kroll Map Company just north of downtown Seattle.
Julie Sweetkind-Singer provided the National Geospatial Advisory Committee (NGAC) report. The NGAC meet in Shepherdstown, West Virginia on September 5-6, 2018. The Committee heard reports from Federal liaisons, discussed the updated National Spatial Data Infrastructure Strategic Plan, and worked in four subcommittees on a variety of topics. A full description of the meeting may be found by reading the following blog post: https://stanford.io/2QVgkSk.
Old Business
None.
New Business
Policies and Procedures
Tom Brittnacher discussed changes to the Policies and Procedures document. The document is being updated and revised. WAML members are encouraged to make comments on the current document that will be presented to the membership in early October. The comment period will be open until October 31, 2018. After the closing date, the comments will be reviewed and approved by the Board.
Bylaws Changes
The Executive Board placed before the membership changes to two of the Bylaws that govern the Western Association of Map Libraries. The first was to extend the term of the Treasurer from two to three years (7.3). The second was to add Texas to the organization’s Principal Region (10.1).
According to the Bylaws, the proposed changes to the amendments were read and discussed at the Business meeting of the Membership. The Secretary is now responsible for submitting the proposed amendments to the entire Membership by ballot with appropriate explanatory comments with any arguments for or against the proposed amendments. The ballot will be sent to the members on October 1, 2018 and must be completed by October 31, 2018. The amendments will be adopted if approved by a majority of the valid ballots returned.
Proposed Bylaw Amendment: Treasurer Term Change
The Executive Board proposes that the WAML Bylaws be amended to extend the term of the Treasurer from two to three years.
Current Bylaw:
7.3 The term of office for each of the officers, with the exception of Treasurer, shall be one year and shall begin on July 1. The term of office for the Treasurer shall be two years and shall begin on July 1.
Proposed Bylaw:
7.3 The term of office for each of the officers, with the exception of Treasurer, shall be one year and shall begin on July 1. The term of office for the Treasurer shall be three years and shall begin on July 1.
Justification:
The Treasurer’s role involves legal dealings with the bank and other financial institutions, as well as knowledge of federal and state regulations related to non-profit organizations. Each transition from outgoing to incoming Treasurer involves legal transactions and extensive coordination. A longer term provides for more continuity and fewer transitions.
Proposed Bylaw Amendment: Add Texas to the Principal Region
The Executive Board proposes that the WAML Bylaws be amended to add Texas to the list of states and provinces in WAML’s principal region.
Current Bylaw:
10.1 The following states of the United States and provinces of Canada shall comprise the Principal Region for the purpose of selecting the sites of general meetings of the Membership:
Alaska
Alberta
Arizona
British Columbia
California
Colorado
Hawaii
Idaho
Montana
Nevada
New Mexico
Oregon
Utah
Washington
Wyoming
Proposed Bylaw:
10.1 The following states of the United States and provinces of Canada shall comprise the Principal Region for the purpose of selecting the sites of general meetings of the Membership:
Alaska
Alberta
Arizona
British Columbia
California
Colorado
Hawaii
Idaho
Montana
Nevada
New Mexico
Oregon
Texas
Utah
Washington
Wyoming
Justification:
Many members from Texas have joined WAML, and they are eager to play an active role in the organization. Although members may come from anywhere in the world, adding Texas to the principal region allows for members from Texas to host general meetings. While the WAML bylaws do not specify that the principal region must only include regions in the West, the name of the organization implies that the geographical location should be a consideration. However, Texas does lie west of the Mississippi River, and so can justifiably be considered geographically in the West.
Task force on the mission statement
Phil White explained the Task Force and asked for participation from the membership.
Sponsorship of the Mapping the Grand Canyon Conference
Matthew Toro is hosting the Mapping the Grand Canyon Conference to be held at Arizona State University from February 28 to March 1, 2019. He requested some form of collaboration or sponsorship from WAML. The membership agreed to a motion that authorized WAML to underwrite the support of two WAML Ambassadors to the Mapping the Grand Canyon event using criteria developed by the Board for the dollar amount of $500 per person. Julie Sweetkind-Singer agreed to draft the criteria to apply for the funding to be reviewed, changed, and approved by the Board. It is expected that the winners will promote the organization throughout the event.
Future meetings
The 2019 meeting will be held at the University of Nevada, Reno and will be hosted by Chrissy Klenke. The 2020 meeting will be held at the University of Idaho and will be hosted by Bruce Godfrey.
Other new business
Chris Thiry requested that new WAML pins be made.
Many members requested that there be a code of conduct for the conference added to the conference manual to be used for all future meetings. The code of conduct has already been written, it simply needs to be moved forward for each conference.
The meeting was adjourned at 2:36pm.