2022-09-07 Executive Board Meeting Minutes

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Minutes
WAML Executive Board Meeting 
September 7, 2022
10:00am PST / 1:00pm EST

Call meeting to order: 10:00 AM PST

Officers in attendance: Katherine Strickland (President), Jessica Benner (Vice President), Evan Thornberry (Past President), Rebecca Seifried (Secretary), Bruce Godfrey (Treasurer)

Other attendees:  Laura McElfresh

Approval of Minutes from last meeting:

Officer Reports & Check-In:

  • Katherine Strickland (President)
    • Conference update: 63 registrations so far. Reminders will be sent out today. Webinar license is in process.
  • Jessica Benner (Vice President)
    • Read through the Conference Manual in anticipation of planning for next year. Renewed WAML membership and registered for the conference.
      Noted that some information may be out-of-date; i.e. “Promotional activities should be coordinated with the WAML Web Communications Committee.” This should be updated to the Social Media Manager (Amy Work).
  • Evan Thornberry (Past President)
    • Update from Matt Parsons (current owner of the WAML domain): he was charged for “waml.online” but doesn’t know where the charge came from, requesting reimbursement.The domain has always been waml.org, and we’ve reimbursed him for that charge upon receipt of an invoice. The domain service he is using is registrar.com. Could this be spam? Should we not pay for something we aren’t using? 
    • ACTION: Evan will follow-up on this issue with the E-Board by email.
  • Rebecca Seifried (Secretary)
    • Nothing to report.
  • Bruce Godfrey (Treasurer)
    • Wrote two groups of checks: honorarium checks (approved during 6/7/22 meeting) and the three scholarship checks (approved by email 8/24/22).

Actions approved over email by E-Board since June 2022 E-Board meeting:

  • Minutes approved on July 27, 2022.
  • Phil White requested approval for the WAML Scholarship Committee to award three scholarships in the amount of $500. The committee first gave three scholarships in 2020, but last year only ended up awarded two. Evan noted that this year’s conference sponsors are contributing directly toward the scholarship. Approved on 8/24/22

Appointed Position Reports:

  • No reports submitted.
  • ACTION: Becky will contact appointed positions (cc: Evan and Kat) to request reports for the Business Meeting, scheduled for Tuesday 9/20 in the first hour of the conference. Evan as Past President will chair that meeting.

Updates from task forces, committees, etc.

  • Scholarship Committee (Philip White)
    • The Scholarship Committee started work in May of this year on the scholarship process, and we agreed to continue the format that has been successful over the past two years. Applicants provide an open ended response to a map or GIS project that is impactful in the context of social equity or justice. We had five applicants, which was in line with the numbers from the past few years (although less than we would have liked). The three recipients were great candidates, though! Méch Frazier (pronounced ‘Meesh’), Wilsinia Ocasio, and Jo-Ann Wong were each awarded $500 scholarships. We’ll be hearing from each of them in the scholarship winners session during the WAML conference.
  • Discussion about the history of the scholarships
    • Formerly it was 2 awards of $750 each (one for Diversity and one for an Early Career Librarian) intended to fund travel to/from the in-person conference. When the conference went virtual in 2020, the Scholarship Committee decided to reduce the amount to $500 but give 3 awards. 
    • If we resume meeting in person in 2023, we’ll want to revisit this. Phil is aware that a change may need to happen if the format meeting changes.
    • Question about what the $500 scholarship is being used for if the meeting is virtual. The award is still valid for a future in-person meeting – that’s the intent behind it.

Old Business:

  • Appointed positions (Evan)
    • The new positions approved last term need to be updated in the Policies and Procedures Google doc, posted on the website, and announced to membership. Ideally these will be finalized before the WAML Conference.
    • Policies and Procedures Google Doc changes:
      • ACTION: Evan will share the documentation about necessary changes with the E-Board; Evan and Kat will update the doc.
    • Website changes:
      • Kevin and Kat both have editing permissions. 
      • ACTION: Kat will reach out to Kevin to coordinate updating the website.
    • Announcement to membership:
      • ACTION: Once the changes are finalized on the website, Becky will email the WAML listserv; Evan will help draft the message.
  • Stanford physical address (Evan/Bruce)
    • Evan is in the process of signing an MOU with Stanford to get a WAML physical address. The goal is to be able to register the domain with the WAML organization, which requires a physical address. Last contact with Julie (Head, Branner Earth Sciences Library & Map Collections) about the issue was around May, when she was going to take it to the Deputy University Librarian for a signature.
    • The WAML domain is up for renewal for another 3 years in early 2023. 
    • Alternative ideas:
      • Domain responsibilities could be transferred over to Kevin (the current web admin), but it doesn’t make sense in the long run to keep transferring the domain between volunteers.
      • Physical address could be registered somewhere other than Stanford. However, the address does need to be in California, and WAML has a strong relationship with Stanford, including being the location of the WAML Archive. Evan doesn’t think it’s necessary to start thinking about an alternative yet.
    • ACTION: Evan will restart the conversation after the conference.
  • Listserv migration (Evan)
    • Nick (Membership Manager) is now responsible for managing the WAML listserv, but the listserv is still being managed by Matt Parsons. Adding people to the listserv is a manual process that involves lots of emailing and entails delays. The goal is to combine the listserv with membership management features built into the new WordPress site to improve/simplify the process of adding members to the list. A WordPress plugin would allow sending messages to the entire membership.
    • Suggested timeframe is to allow for a 1-year migration period, during which the listserv would remain active while the WordPress feature is launched.
    • Concerns:
      • Where can we archive the previous WAML listserv emails? Will this version be searchable / interactive? Could it be packaged as a web page and included in the archive at Stanford?
      • If the listserv is kept online at UW in order to retain a live, searchable version, is there any danger of it being lost? 
    • Priorities
      • 1 – Archive the past listserv emails.
      • 2 – Keep a working, searchable version still live.
    • ACTION: Evan will coordinate a meeting (separate from E Board) with Kevin, Matt, and Nick. Suggestion to loop in Andria (Archivist).

New Business:

  • Inviting membership to attend E-Board meetings (Becky)
    • E-Board meetings are supposed to be open to members to attend, according to our bylaws (3.7). Last year, Evan sent a single email to waml-L with a list of all the future meetings, asking which specific meetings people wanted to attend; responses were difficult to manage. For this month, Becky emailed the WAML listserv with an invitation to attend, and individual members contacted Becky if they wanted the Zoom link. 
    • Evan and Kat suggested using the registration feature in Zoom to (1) track expected attendees, (2) expedite members accessing the Zoom link, (3) make it easier to contact expected attendees in the event the meeting is canceled.
    • Concerns:
      • Should we establish a deadline to register for the meeting?
      • Becky can’t add other E-Board members as co-hosts because they are outside her organization.
      • E-Board members might need to register for each meeting.
    • ACTION: Becky will try setting up registration for next month’s meeting (10/5) to see how it goes; will send a direct link to the E-Board and update the Outlook invite with that link to see if this avoids them having to register.
  • Committee review (Evan)
    • Continuing Education – Jon Jablonski has expressed interest in retiring the committee. The group was originally put together to host workshops throughout the year, but it evolved to coordinate pre-conference workshops. Of late it has been dormant.
      • The website lists these members:
        • Paige Andrew (2009-)
        • Mary Douglas (2005-)
        • Jon Jablonski (2010-), Chair
        • Katie Lage (2016-)
        • Kathy Rankin (2005-)
        • Julie Sweetkind-Singer (2005-)
      • Could this committee be evolved, rather than ended? Ideas:
        • Potential collaborations with ROLGGE and MAGIRT.
        • Maintain a page on the website – a one-stop-shop for professional development in the field, similar to the Toolbox (also managed by Jon).
      • ACTION: Kat will email Jon (cc: Jessica, Evan) to initiate conversation about evolving the group.
    • Web Communications – it is unclear whether this group ever started activities. The group may have been a holdover from the old website, but since replaced by the Social Media Manager (Amy) position.
      • The website lists these members:
        • Chair: vacant
        • Nick Beyelia (2021 – )
        • Ken Rockwell (2016 – )
        • ex-officio: daniel Brendle-Moczuk (2011-), WebAdministrator
        • Chrissy Klenke, IB Editor (2018- )
        • Jon Jablonski, IB Production Editor (2009 -)
        • Georgia Lee Brown, News & Notes Editor (2020 – )
        • Jon Jablonski, Map Librarians’ Toolbox editor (2018 – )
      • Idea 1 – the group could integrated into Amy’s work as Social Media Manager.
      • Idea 2 – the group could be morphed into an “Appointed Positions” committee (which is nearly is already, based on membership).
        • Would require refreshing the membership – ask if Ken, daniel, Jon still want to be involved or if they can be retired from the committee. Kat thinks Jon should stay on the group because he is active with the Toolbox.
        • Are there requirements for how frequently committees meet? No – it’s up to each group. Perhaps this group could meet quarterly, potentially in place of one of the E-Board meetings.
      • Suggestion to reread the charge for each committee before initiating any changes. The most current version is the Policies and Procedures in Google Drive (see next agenda item).
      • ACTION: Jessica will reach out to current members (cc: Kat) to ask if they want to stay on and to propose reframing the group as an Appointed Positions committee.
    • Ad-Hoc Web Committee Task Force (Evan Thornberry) – no longer exists.
    • MAGIRT-WAML Joint Task Group on Core Elements for Description of Geospatial Datasets (Louise) – Becky reached out to Louise to find out about this group, waiting on a response. Kat believes this is from a long time ago.
    • Updating the Policies and Procedures
  • Future WAML Conference planning
    • Survey of membership – Kat would like to send this out in tandem with the conference. Kat can talk about it in the intro talk and add links to slides throughout the conference.
      • Topics to include:
        • Where conference attendees are located
        • How much institutional support (funding) attendees have for in-person meeting
        • Other conference obligations and typical dates (ALA-MAGIRT, NACIS, CARTA, etc)
        • Travel restrictions for CA (and other) state employees 
        • Interest in attending a conference held in a non-western state
      • ACTION: Kat will draft a survey in Qualtrics and send it to the E-Board for feedback.
    • Travel bans
    • Can we include the East Coast for potential in-person hosting?
      • The Conference Planning Committee has no members in the Pacific time zone. Kat’s goal is specifically about conference location, not about rebranding the organization.
      • The bylaws state that “The Association shall hold general meetings at times and places within the Principal Region as selected by the Executive Board after consultation with the Membership.” Amending the bylaws would require a vote by the entire membership.
      • Suggested first step: gauge interest via the survey. If there is interest, we could create an ad hoc committee to explore this. Any change should be slow, ideally piloted. Ex: explore options (such as alternating east and west, or west and “not west”) to increase equity.
    • Historical data
      • Nick (maybe with help from Greg?) could provide data about historical yearly membership, with the goal of looking at membership by state to see how/if it has changed over time.
    • Hybrid format for next conference
      • UBC: If we plan a conference at UBC, it should be before late August to avoid the start of semester. Evan has run a couple of hybrid talks recently, and UBC is set up well for hybrid presentations. Another draw is the potential collaboration with Internet Archive. The main issue with affordable Vancouver is that lodging is hard to find.
      • Alternate locations: U Idaho – currently there is a CA travel ban; also hard to travel to. Hawaii – even more expensive than Vancouver.
      • ACTION: Jessica will reach out to Code4Lib planners to ask if someone can give us tips for how to run a successful hybrid conference.
      • ACTION: Evan will start a conversation with his supervisor soon; hopes to have the final decision in a few weeks.
    • Timing
      • The Conference Manual says we need to announce the location at the prior conference. So technically we should be ready to announce the location in 2 weeks. Kat notes that the manual is a pre-pandemic publication, and that in the past the wrangling of next year’s conference organizers has happened at the WAML conference (not necessarily before).

Potential Social Media Announcements:

  • New section of the agenda, requested by Amy!
  • Conference related announcements:
    • Any more announcements scheduled on the Gantt chart
    • Scholarship winners (Phil) – but confirm with Phil that projects can be shared
    • Anti-eviction map
    • Existing public projects on the program schedule
    • Trivia (Kim)
  • Future announcements – highlight cool projects; don’t have to restrict announcements just to map librarian things.
  • ACTION: Evan will email this list to Amy (connecting with Phil and Kim).

Next Meeting:

  • Annual Business Meeting, Tuesday, 9/20/22 at 12:00pm EST
  • E-Board Meeting, Wednesday, 10/5/22 at 1:00pm EST

Meeting adjourned: 2:59pm EST

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