Present:  Laura Cohen, Randy Gadikian, Carey Hatch, Pam Peters, Janet Potter, Larry Randall, Judy Sikora, Laurie Thompson, Barbara von Wahlde, Maureen Zajkowski, Connie Perrin (Staff)

Excused: John Anderson, John Homburger, Michael Pisa

Guest: Ron Brown (ITEC)

Janet suggested that a discussion by the Library Directors' Executive Board regarding student fees for library use be added to the agenda.

Janet had two announcements for the group:

1. Tom Neiss resigned from SAC in December. 2. Laurie Thompson's last SAC meeting will be in March; Council members expressed appreciation for Laurie's service.

The minutes for the meeting of December 3, 2002 were approved as distributed.

Carey explained that SFX trainings are being held in Syracuse today and tomorrow. Final trainings are scheduled for April in Farmingdale and Purchase. Carey stated that everything is proceeding as expected.

Carey stated that a $1200 yearly increase in tuition has been proposed. The university-wide budget and that of System Administration will remain whole. According to Carey, the ETI, Library Automation and Networking appear untouched. There has been a reduction in Bundy Aid for private higher ed as well as changes to TAP.

Carey mentioned that interviews for the Executive Director for NYSHEI will begin Feb. 5. The annual NYSHEI meeting will be held just prior to the Nylink annual meeting in April. The meeting will take place in the Gideon Putnam hotel in Saratoga Springs.

Carey explained that Distinguished Service Professor Ram Chugh's study on a "Rational Tuition Policy" commissioned by the Faculty Senate was endorsed and also received praise from senior administrators within System Administration.

The data scrubbing component to remove the linkage between patron records and circulation history should be available for testing in March. The OLIS will review procedures and make recommendations on its implementations. The OLIS has concerns regardless of scrubbing; backup tapes of data will contain the linked patron/circulation information.

Resumes are being screened for the position of Assistant Provost for Learning Environments. This position oversees the SUNY Learning Network, SUNY Teaching Learning and Technology, and SUNY's participation in Merlot.

Maureen provided the following LMS update:

• In January OLIS held conversations with Ex Libris. We reviewed a document from Ex Libris that outlined SUNY assumptions of the Union Catalog project. The conversations addressed areas that Ex Libris had misunderstood or had questions on. Ex Libris was to use the resulting information to determine what they already have available so that SUNY can move forward.
• Michael Kaplan stated (at his 2/14 meeting in Albany) that Sami Kamhi, who came on board last summer as the new President and CEO of Ex Libris, Ltd., is no longer with the company. Michael did not have any additional information. Azriel Morag, Chairman of the Board of Ex Libris, is currently assuming these responsibilities.

 On motion made by Laurie Thompson, seconded by Judy Sikora and carried, the SUNYConnect Advisory Council authorized Chair, Janet Potter, to draft a letter to the President of Ex Libris explaining SAC's displeasure with the Union Catalog implementation process and asking him to take measures to expedite both development and implementation.

 Group3 Status

• Ex Libris may assign another staff member part-time for implementation support.
• The current schedule has Group4 starting in March, two months before the last of Group3 switch to production dates. Discussions within OLIS and between OLIS and Ex Libris have concluded that the beginning of Group4 needs to be re-considered based on:
• Group3 has four more campuses than Group2; this is an increase of 50% and has had a greater impact than expected on the ability of both Ex Libris and OLIS staff to provide guidance and support during the implementations.
• the overlap in the schedule was based on the assumption that conversation activities would be addressed early on, thus freeing up more time for campuses to address configuration and training. This has not been the case. As a result OLIS and ITEC staff will travel to Chicago to meet with Ex Libris conversion programmer staff to review the data conversion process and programs. The goal is to determine what greater role SUNY can play in the conversion process.
• configuration setup continues to be a time consuming and difficult activity for campuses; OLIS is now in discussion with Ex Libris as to ways configuration/table setup can be streamlined and done more centrally.
• Aleph training requires a great deal of campus staff time; OLIS is investigating how training might be additionally tailored to deliver training absolutely required and to defer other training until after switch to production.
• Maureen explained the Group4 schedule will be finalized by the end of February and that SAC members will remain updated.

• The patch 4 upgrade was successfully completed in January for the nine campuses housed on the Oswego server. The work done by Oswego for the upgrade will become a model for subsequent patch changes.
• The SCTech group (ITEC, Oswego IT support, OLIS) has been addressing a number of issues associated with maintaining consistency across the multi-campus servers related to Aleph installations, application of hotfixes, and developing processes for ensuring uniformity across the server environments.
• Westaleph server at ITEC is hosting eleven implementations as well as the upgrade of Fredonia to version 14.2. The volume of implementation (data loads and indexing) has had a significant impact on the performance of the server. ITEC personnel have been expending significant time and resources to address these issues. Since the multi-campus server environment differs from the standard Aleph installations, the Ex Libris technical staff can provide only limited support.

Meetings were held in January with staff from the University Centers at Albany and Buffalo with Ex Libris and OLIS. The meetings addressed hardware selection and implementation support. Maureen stated that each of the University Centers will have its own server environment.

• Both University Centers have chosen to begin implementation with version 16. It is expected to be available for new installations in fall 2003.
• Ex Libris implementation support will come from Israel.
• Timeframes - have hardware in place by summer; install of Aleph version 16 in September, implementation continues through the following summer with proposed switch to production dates of July 2004.

 LAND Delivery System Update

Carrie Nyc of Nylink sent an e-mail to Janet explaining that LAND went live on January 6. Carrie has received positive feed back from the librarians who are using LAND. Drivers have been arriving at the libraries at the scheduled times and materials are being delivered within the promised turn-around time. Carrie will soon begin receiving monthly statistic reports regarding LAND and has offered to keep SAC updated. Now that LAND is fully operational, Nylink will concentrate on improving the service for all participating libraries.

 SAC passed the following resolution with respect to Nylink:

 On motion made by Pam Peters, seconded by Laura Cohen and carried, the SUNYConnect Advisory Council members agreed to draft a letter expressing their appreciation to Nylink for all its efforts in successfully launching LAND.

 Finance Committee Report - Randy

Following some discussion, council members recommended that the Finance Committee examine e-resource usage to see if a model of payment based on usage is possible. The Finance Committee is to provide a report back to SAC at the first fall meeting.

Randy discussed the present plan for billing and raised the issue of what should happen in the future. Members agreed that the Finance Committee should take a look at the annual inflationary increase and examine the existing five year plan for revenue and expenditure. Carey suggested that committee members also consider hardware issues. Janet asked the Finance Committee to collect this data for the June meeting.

Carey said he met with Steve Crandall from Alfred about their new annual charge of $38,000. SAC members agreed that Carey should propose a one time buy-in cost and a surcharge not to exceed 20 percent of SUNY costs.

Carey reported that the JSTOR proposal arrived in August. He said he will propose a JSTOR buy-in to all campuses for the 2003-04 fiscal year.

Larry reported that a meeting is scheduled for February 20 in Albany with representatives from Elsevier to address the terms and conditions surrounding the renewal of ScienceDirect. A pre-meeting conference call is planned for February 12.

Larry referred to the e-mail he sent to SAC explaining the purpose and features of the E-Resource Flexible Selection Program. The plan calls for a reduced core of resources available to all, with a broader array of resources from which campuses can select. All resources would be purchased with funds derived from SUNYConnect fees and System Administration contributions. Nylink would act as the contracting agent and could offer any of the "SUNYConnect approved" products to a broader constituency. The group concurred it was worth pursuing. Janet suggested the SAC finance committee examine the financial aspects of the program in more detail. The core vs. the optional side will also be explored in more depth.

According to Carey, ITEC is in the process of implementing eleven campuses. Eleven more are scheduled for the future. Ron said that disc storage needs to be replicated and that quick data disaster recovery is necessary. He also said various issues involving architecture need to be addressed.

The need for an additional server was raised. Carey agreed to work with ITEC on an analysis of ORACLE architecture, business continuity and cost. He will report to SAC with an appropriate recommendation at the June meeting.

The following issues were raised by the Storage Subcommittee after analysis of the Reese Dill report: They feel that OLIS should take the lead with storage issues. They felt that the report should be more inclusive, for example, should the model be regional, central or other? They asked specific questions such as what would be more cost-effective: short or long term leases? The committee recommended continued collaboration with the Construction Fund. SAC members agreed that the Executive Committee should examine these suggestions and prepare a follow-up for the next meeting.

Because of time constraints, the Bylaws discussion was postponed until the next meeting.

The following agenda items were identified for discussion with the Provost on March 19, 2003 in Albany:

Upcoming Capital Plan

Storage/Construction Fund

Refurbishing of libraries

Janet reported that a member had proposed to the executive board of the SUNY Council of Library Directors that SUNY libraries investigate assessing student fees to fund electronic resources. The executive board suggested that SAC look at the issue of fees in a general way. SAC members agreed that this would not likely be a central focus of the discussion on funding electronic resources.

Janet stated that Laura, Mike and Pam will conclude their terms in June. Laura and Mike are eligible for an additional term. Replacements are needed for Tom (pending bylaws change), Pam and Laurie.

 The next meeting is scheduled for March 19, 2003 in Albany.

 Adjournment.

Respectfully submitted,

Pam Peters, Secretary, Draft prepared by Connie Perrin (Staff)