PRESIDENT / JOAN WEBER:

Dynamic interest groups and the dedication of individual members are pivotal for sustaining the vitality of WLA. This year interest group annual reports reflect both these qualities. Interest groups customarily energetic and active, are continuing that legacy. Several interest groups experiencing difficult times are exploring imaginative, alternate methods of providing avenues to connect to members with shared concerns.

I would be remiss if I did not comment on the financial status of WLA. The familiar phrase, live better with less is the current mantra of the Executive Board and interest groups. Everyone is finding creative ways to live within our means and to insure our future prosperity.

Interest groups accepted this challenge and are designing dynamic break-even programs. Mentioned in several reports, some activities have also garnered a profit for WLA. committees also are rising to the challenge and looking for alternate cost-effective methods of completing their work. For example, the Legislative Committee now meets via weekly conference calls during the legislative session. Face-to-face meetings will occur in the Fall for the heads-up from Steve Duncan, and just before Legislative Day. The Olympia Report is distributed three times per session, not weekly, unless additional issues are necessary. (The WLA Homepage includes links to information about all library related legislation.)

Because of the commitment of the Executive Board to this project and the magnificent work of Martha Parsons, WLA Webmaster, the WLA Homepage (WLA Online) empowers you to be well informed and involved with WLA events and activities. The most recent addition of Members Voices - A Discussion Forum provides focused discussion opportunities for WLA members.

Please take a few minutes to read the accomplishments and activities of the officers and interest groups in this years annual report. It will be apparent that the strength of WLA resides with the activities of the interest groups and active participation of its members.

As I begin my third and final year as WLA President, I thank everyone who has mad a difference this past year through their involvement with WLA. I challenge all WLA members to make this association an important aspect of your life.

VICE PRESIDENT-PRESIDENT ELECT / CINDY CUNNINGHAM

The WLA Vice President is charged with overseeing legislative affairs, including Legislative Day and Federal Relations Coordinator, the Nominating Committee, and with reaching out to the library community, and to other associations. There is also a strong liaison role with the Associations interest groups, and with the Intellectual Freedom Committee.

In 1997 the decision was made, by both the president and vice president, to have the president continue to co-chair the Legislative Planning Committee. The vice president will continue to be the main liaison with the Legislative Day committee and will in fact have more active oversight into the choice of committee members and the activities of the group.

Legislative Day 1998 was held at the Ramada Inn, Governors House, just 5 blocks away from Capitol Hill. This was a new departure, designed to attract more legislators to lunch and make it easier for participants to get to Capitol Hill. We will continue to think about how to make an effective Legislative Day--Steve Duncan and VP Cindy Cunningham will meet to discuss some factors. Should legislators continue to be invited to lunch? shall we plan the briefing sessions differently, offer box lunches and get people out on the hill, focusing on getting folks to Capitol Hill and not in developing an entire morning of programming? What activities can we plan in the interim times to get legislators involved in library issues--local briefing sessions on their home turf? Tom Moak, chair for 1999, will also take part in these discussions.

In general the legislative session went well for libraries--at the zero hour the state library budget was even given its requested budget including a $200,000 request for continuing to develop GILS, the Government Information Locator Service. This was a short session, and no controversial issues that could have affected libraries made it out of committee.

The Nominating Committee, headed by Jan Ames of the Washington Talking Book and Braille Library, attracted some very strong and able candidates, but Jan expressed concern that we need to find ways to attract younger librarians to this association. Additionally, some of the candidates were so well known and established, it would be seen as almost throwing away a future potential board member by asking them to run against such a stacked deck. As a result, several of our positions this year had only one candidate.

The biggest outside association issue that was raised in late 1997, to be solved in 1998, continues to be reciprocal membership in WLMA (Washington Library Media Association), the largest other association that has joint membership with WLA, largely through the CAYAS (Childrens and Young Adult Services) interest group. Cindy has been charged with meeting with WLMA board members and working on a solution, to be presented to the board at the June retreat.

The year 1997 saw an aggressive effort, on the part of the state library and the Washington Advisory Council on Libraries, with the participation of the Washington State Library Commission, to create a statewide plan for libraries and a five-year plan specifically geared towards the new Library Services and Technology Act. A consultant, Liz McGoon, and Associates was hired to conduct a series of regional forums on the needs for and direction of technology in the state of Washington. The results of these forums were summarized, a follow-up videoconference was broadcast, and a representative group of librarians, friends, trustees, and government agency folks was pulled together to work more on the plan and the implementation of it. The plans, have since been widely distributed, and the specific action items are still being addressed by this representative group, being pulled together by the state library.

As a result of the change in federal funding, the Washington Advisory Council on Libraries (WSACL) disbanded in late 1997 in order to form a more representative group to work with Washington State Library Commission and advise on the expenditure of federal funds. A new, more representative group, is being formed in the spring of 1998. WLA will not have automatic representation on this board.

SECRETARY / CAROL GILL SCHUYLER

As Secretary of WLA, I have attended all of the Board Meetings, the Annual Business Meeting, and the Spring Planning Retreat. My primary responsibility at each of these meetings was to take minutes, transcribe them, and then present them to the Board for approval. This year both the draft minutes and the approved minutes of the meetings have appeared on the WLA Homepage so that the membership has easy access to the information from Board Meetings in an effort to enhance communication. I have also summarized the discussions in the Board Meetings for each issue of "Link".

Archival duties included going through, literally, dozens of boxes of WLA history. Gail Willis, Kristy Coomes, and I waded through boxes of reports, minutes, publications, program handouts, financial statements, etc. and discarded everything that was a duplicate or no longer essential for the Association. What we kept is now organized and retrievable. Our goal is to complete the project before June.

TREASURER / PATTY DUITMAN

The treasurers report (PDF format) is appended to this document. [Not available online]

COORDINATOR OF CONTINUING EDUCATION / MARY CAMPBELL

Continuing Education Council:

The mission of the WLA Continuing Education Council is to monitor and facilitate continuing education offerings from Interest Groups and other groups affiliated with the Association, and to administer grant funds for educational project seed money. During the 1997/98 year: information about the council and grant application materials were added to the WLA homepage, a Workshop on Workshops geared toward IG chairs and CE coordinators was presented, and a new IG Coordinator was elected. In addition, the following projects were funded.

1. Interlibrary Loan Interest Group Annual Meeting: ILL IG March 23, 1998, Wenatchee. Approved for $1370 seed money, minimum registration 50.
2. On the Front Line: Intellectual Freedom and Customer Service: IFIG and CAYAS Oct/Nov 1997, Feb/Jun 1998 at various locations throughout the state (4 sessions total) Approved for $800 seed money; minimum registration 80.
3. Bringing Puppets to Life: CAYAS November 7th and 14th, 1997 (2 sessions) in Everett and Spokane. Approved for $1370 seed money; minimum registration 50.
4. Good Choices for ESL Learners: LIT October 3, 1997, Seattle. Approved for $387 seed money; minimum registration 14.

All of these programs made (or are expected to make) a profit for WLA. The councils congratulations and thanks go to the individual coordinators and presenters.

Members of the Continuing Education Council for 1997/98: Mary Campbell, Coordinator of Continuing Education, Chair; Nancy Collins-Warner, IG Coordinator; Inez Freeman, 1999 Conference Program co-chair; Pat Kennedy, WALE IG chair; Sue Lang 1999 Conference Program co-chair; Donna McMillen, IG Program Coordinator Conference 98; and Keitha Owen, member-at-large.

COORDINATOR OF COMMUNICATIONS / MIKE WIRT

The Coordinator of Communications responsibilities include direction and oversight of official communications efforts of WLA, oversight of Association publications, and facilitation of budget development for publications and communications.

The most significant activity over the past year has been the continued development of WLA Online, the Associations World Wide Web site and one-stop information source. Virtually all official documents are now available to members via the Web, as well as activity calendars, text versions of Alki and WLA Link, workshop and conference announcements, legislative and membership information. Webmaster Martha Parsons has done an outstanding job of maintaining the web site and coming up with ideas for improvements.

Work continued on communications infrastructure development. The Public Relations Committee description, publications guidelines, and Interest Group communications guidelines were approved by the Board. The Publications Council met for the first time to review heir areas of responsibility and an initial meeting of the Home Page Advisory Committee was scheduled to occur before the end of the year. The PR Committee recommended a revised WLA marketing plan to the Board.

When the next Coordinator of Communications takes office in June, attention can turn from organizational work to facilitating ongoing communications activities.

COORDINATOR OF STRATEGIC PLANNING / JILL JEAN

The strategic plan is on target Major goals set for this year that have been completed include: completion and acceptance of the trustees manual; the adoption of committee and position descriptions and charges; the use of the Internet for communications and all other communications pieces are all in place. Those goals and objectives with later timelines are progressing.

COORDINATOR/CONFERENCE 1998 / JOY NEAL

The 1998 WLA Conference is underway and with great success. Although the money and attendance figures are not all available we feel we have got a great conference on our hands.

The biggest delight is meeting the terms of our contract with the Wenatchee Center. We met and exceeded our numbers staying at the Center Hotel and by including the breakfast and lunch on Thursday in the registration we feel sure we will meet the meal requirements. The inclusion of the meals has proved to be confusing to some, but the majority seem to be able to read a registration form.

We were the first conference to fully use the WLA Web Page for posting information, registration forms, and schedule. That has been an overwhelming success based on the calls I have received. We even had a speakers bureau contact me because they were desperate to get in contact with one of our speakers and did not know where to look for him.

We were also delighted with the monetary gifts from some of our vendors. It was with their help that we could do the little extras like the cookies, music and umbrellas. We hope the umbrellas are enjoyed by those who win them.

Finally, I had a great committee. Wenatchee is too small to field a full committee from the library community here. I used a group of experienced people from the Olympia/South Seattle area and found we didn't have that much trouble working long distance. This should be an encouragement to other conference sites with limited populations to draw from.

As the dust settles I am sure we will find the 1998 WLA Annual Conference was not only a fun, relaxed conference, but very successful as well. Thank you for letting Wenatchee host it again.

COORDINATOR/CONFERENCE 1999 / TOM MOAK

The 1999 Annual Conference was awarded last April to the Tri-Cities, which last hosted a WLA Conference in 1990. The Conference will be held April 29 and 30, 1999 at the Pasco Double Tree Hotel, adjacent to beautiful Sun Willows Golf Course and the Tri-Cities Airport.

Choosing as our theme, Fond Farewells, Bold Beginnings, we will bid adieu to an era and more importantly will anticipate and welcome the next decade, century and millennium for our vibrant, vital profession.

This 1999 conference will be our first one to end on Friday afternoon, so our members can enjoy a great conference and still be home for the weekend. In response to the results of a membership survey that went out with dues statements last December, we believe you will find a new and improved conference with a stronger emphasis on good, valuable, and practical programs. Were looking at changes from length of programs to use of exhibitors to types of programs. We will want to make sure you know about these improvements and our program content enough in advance so that you can make plans to be in the Tri-Cities next April, where bright and brilliant sunshine is almost guaranteed.

Our Conference Committee includes Wayne Suggs, Richland Public Library as Treasurer; Sue Lang, Kennewick Mid-Columbia Library and Inez Freeman, Othello Mid-Columbia Library as Program Chairs; Susan Towne, Support Center Mid-Columbia Library and Connie Farr, Pasco Mid-Columbia Library as Local Arrangements chairs; Harvey Gover, Washington State University-Tri-Cities as Publicity Chair; Nancy Collins-Warner, Neill Public Library (Pullman) as Interest Group Rep; and Wilma Page, Kennewick Mid-Columbia Library, as Preconference Chair.

For more information about or suggestions related to the 1999 Annual Conference, please contact me by email at tom@mcl.lib.wa.us or by phone 1-800-572-6251.

ALA COUNCILOR / JAN WALSH

ALA Executive Director: William R Gordon, director of the Prince Georges County Memorial Library System in Hyattsville, Md., became the new executive director of the American Library Association (ALA) on March 1, 1998.

ALA Website: ALAs site was featured as an example of the kind of support increasingly available for children and adults at libraries across the nation. The site can be found on the associations Web page at http://www.ala.org/parentspage/greatsites/amazing.html.

Diversity: A three year initiative enlists library schools to select 50 minority students of the MLS program each year; those selected would receive ALA funded scholarships of $5000.

Fund for Americas Libraries: The first year goal was to raise $4 million; actual amount raised was $8.4 million, almost all of which is supporting programs in libraries throughout the country.

Intellectual Freedom: Council passed a motion against having all filtered Internet connections in libraries; there should be at least one station without filters.

ALA Strategic Plan: The draft version of ALA Goal 2000 and Beyond: A Strategic Path to 2001 was unveiled. Initiatives included: Diversity; 21st Century Literacy; Intellectual Freedom; Equity of Access; Education and Continuous Learning.

Hawaii Outsourcing: The debate rages on; The Executive Board appointed an Ad Hoc Task Force to examine our professional values as they relate to outsourcing, subcontracting and privatizing of library services.

PNLA REPRESENTATIVE / LINDA PIERCE

(Full report and copies of discussion papers will be available at the WLA Conference)

The 1997/98 year has been one of hard questions for PNLA. Declining membership and financial difficulties have lead the organization to ask difficult questions regarding its viability as an organization and what should the future hold for the organization. To help find answers to those questions over the course of the year, the PNLA Board has conducted member surveys and focus groups to help the Board define the strengths and weaknesses of the Association. As a result the Board determined that while PNLA is not as strong as it had been there was no reason that it could not regain its strength and vibrancy. The Board also concluded that the rebuilding of the Association will focus on its regional nature. As a regional organization it can offer its members a needed opportunity for regional discussion, products and services.

The Board has taken the responsibility to write discussion papers which will help the organization refocus itself. The areas of discussion are: Mission, Publications, Continuing Education (including conferences), Young Reader's Choice Awards, Regional productions and services and Regional issues. Copies of these papers will be in the PNLA Quarterly in the Spring issue.

Finances have been difficult for the Association this year; a Fund Development Coordinator has been appointed to assist in fund raising. We are also confident that increased membership will help our budget situation.

Gordon Ray, Vancouver, B.C. is the current PNLA president, Andrew Johnson of the University of Washington will begin his term as president in August of 1998. The 1997 conference was held in Seattle at the Bell Harbor Convention Center. The 1998 conference will be a joint conference with the Idaho Library Association and will be in Sun Valley, ID, August 12-15. The 1999 conference will be in Calgary, Alberta.

WLFTA REPRESENTATIVE / KATHLEEN ARDREY

The activities of the Washington Friends and Trustees Association Board members include:

1. Held one Annual Meeting and four business meetings.
2. Prepared and presented programs for OLA/WLA Conference.
3. Two members served on the WILL/Rural Libraries planning committees.
4. Two members were invited to participate on a WILL 97 panel program.
5. The Washington State Trustees Manual was published and distributed at the fall WILL 97 Conference.
6. Work is underway on the Washington State Friends Handbook.
7. Several Friends groups were active in the Library Legislative Day sponsored by WLA in 1998.
8. Published and distributed the newsletter Advocate during the year.
9. Support is building among many state Friends groups to support Friends of the Library Week in April 1998.
10. One member of the WLFTA board served on the WLA PR Committee.
11. Successfully lobbied to continue the WLFTA Representatives position on the WLA Board as a voting member.
12. Two members were invited to participate on the State-wide Plan for Washington Libraries.
13. Planned two programs for WLA Conference 1998.
14. Continued to seek out more friends and trustees to advocate by belonging to WLA and WLFTA.

WLA LINK EDITOR / MARY HILLMAN

The WLA Link was published five times during the past year.

Martha Parsons successfully mounted the Link on the WLA Homepage. The Link is now available much more quickly for those members with Internet access. Martha was able to combine some features of the Homepage and the Link, such as the Executive Board and Interest Group Chair lists as well as the calendar.

Linda Rhines, Lakeside School Librarian was appointed and served one year as co-editor. She will assume the position of editor in April 1998. The search for a new co-editor is underway.

One significant change occurred in the production process this year. Diamond Press, our mailing service, requested a $290 deposit before each publications mailing. This deposit request was made in relation to the increase in mailing fees.

FEDERAL RELATIONS COORDINATOR / NANCY ZUSSY

Among the federal issues tracked and communicated to WLA membership were:

Federal Funding for library programs: The Library Services and Technology Act (LSTA) received its first appropriation for FY98. This act replaces the long-running Library Services and Construction Act (LSCA) and focuses federal resources more on outcomes for library users and the application of technology to attain access goals. Evaluation will be a cornerstone of the new act. The first appropriation for LSTA exceeded the last one for LSCA.

Funding for school library related programs was less successful, with the Elementary and Secondary Education act being largely unfunded in that area with no promise that that situation will change in the near future. However, with the heavy emphasis on cooperation and collaboration in LSTA, school libraries may receive funding as part of a local partnership.

Intellectual property/copyright: The electronic information environment is moving creators and distributors of information to pressure Congress for changes in copyright law. Libraries have been well represented in the Digital Futures Coalition -- a group of authors, publishers, libraries, and others -- in an attempt to preserve the concept of fair use in libraries. Legislation is now moving that would preserve that balance, but other bills also introduced would erode that concept. The American Library Association and its divisions continue to work assiduously on this issue.

E-rate discounts: The much touted telecommunications discounts for libraries program has been confused and confusing at the federal level. Information has been scarce, with many questions remaining at any one time. Critics of the program in Congress continue to question the efficacy of the program and are watching its development carefully.

Internet Decency revisited: In early February, 1998, the U.S. Senate introduced a bill that would tie receipt of federal subsidies (including e-rate discounts) and federal funds (including LSTA) to the installation of filtering software on at least one public access computer terminal accessible to children in U.S. schools and libraries. This measure, co-sponsored by Washington Senator Patty Murray, does not address the problem of the many libraries that can support only one terminal. The WLA Board and the State Librarian are working with Senator Murrays office and ALA-Washington as this measure continues to develop.

For further information, contact Nancy Zussy, State Librarian, P.O. Box 42460, Olympia, WA 98504-2460. Phone 360-753-2915, Fax 360-586-7575. E-mail nzussy@statelib.wa.gov

COMMITTEE REPORTS

ALKI EDITORIAL COMMITTEE / LOUISE SAYLOR

The report of the work of this committee is incorporated into the Coordinator Communication's report.

AWARDS COMMITTEE / AMY RAVENHOLT

Working with the WLFTA representative, the nominations materials were reviewed, nominations were solicited from the voting membership and individuals were selected to receive awards at the annual conference.

BUDGET COMMITTEE / JOAN WEBER

The budget committee prepared the 1997-98 budget and presented it for executive board approval at the spring retreat.

ELECTIONS COMMITTEE / KAREN MICHAELSEN

The Elections Committee met as needed over the last year to count and validate ballots for not only the annual election of officers, but also board issues that required the vote of the membership.

FISCAL IMPACT COMMITTEE

The association has had difficulty in recruiting members with the expertise needed to serve on this committee. Kim Hixson, Fiscal Supervisor at Fort Vancouver Regional Library, will serve the 1998-9 term.

INTELLECTUAL FREEDOM COMMITTEE/CHER RAVAGNI

Intellectual Freedom Committee members continued to work on the WLA IF HANDBOOK; more current information on policies, strategies and laws will be integrated into the final product. A hard copy and electronic product is anticipated.

We participated in Washington Coalition Against Censorship meetings and activities during the year. Activities included consulting with school librarians in the Greater Puget Sound area regarding attempts to remove books and development of policies regarding gay and lesbian materials in school libraries.

The Committee remained a consultative resource for the WLA Board. The Chair attended one Board meeting and addressed communication issues that arise during state legislative sessions. Board members were helpful with suggestions about those concerns.

IFC members are: Candy Morgan, Fort Vancouver Regional Library, Sally Kintner, Whatcom County Library, Susan Veltfort, King County Library, Mike Wessells, Timberland Regional Library (ex-officio), Cher Ravagni, Seattle Public Library (Chair)

LEGISLATIVE PLANNING COMMITTEE / JOAN WEBER/BILL PTACEK CO-CHAIRS

The work of this committee is included in the President's report.

NOMINATIONS COMMITTEE / JAN AMES

The nominations committee sought out and selected excellent candidates to run for elected offices for the 1998-00 term.

ORGANIZATIONAL/BYLAWS AND ARCHIVES COMMITTEES / KRISTY COOMES

During this year the organizational task was to complete the position descriptions for voting members of the WLA Board, for contracted positions, and descriptions of standing committees and Councils. The Board voted to accept the descriptions and will review them regularly in the future. Some oversight responsibilities were reviewed during the year, with the major change being the shift of the Legislative Planning Committee to the responsibility of the President, rather than the Vice President/President Elect.

The Archives Committee tackled the many boxes of WLA minutes reports, surveys, newsletters, correspondence, etc., finding many duplicates as well as other materials that were no longer needed for historical/archival purposes. At last count sixteen boxes of materials had been reviewed, organized and/or recycled. The historical files are now beginning to take shape, but the review and sorting tasks will continue at least through the next year.

PUBLIC RELATIONS/MEMBERSHIP / MARY CARR

The work of this committee is included in the report of the Coodinator of Communications.

SCHOLARSHIP COMMITTEE / TONY WILSON

The scholarship committee revised and consolidated the scholarship criteria to include distance learning students in the eligibility for the graduate student scholarship and expanding the conference scholarship grant program to association wide eligibility. The board adopted these recommendations and the scholarship committee recruited and selected awardees based on the new criteria for this year's conference.

INTEREST GROUP REPORTS

ARGH!/AUTOMATED RESOURCES INTEREST GROUP
JEANNE CRISP/DON WILLIS CO-CHAIRS

For the 1997 conference, Willem Scholten from the Technical Resource Institute for the Public Library, and others, participated in two ARGH! sponsored programs focused on computer security and emerging technologies. For the 1998 conference, WSUs Cooperative Extension Energy Programs Scott Deckers program will focus on Telecommuting/Telework. In between, this has been an inactive year. A quiet year. Contemplating the year 2000 problem. And why disk drives we have inserted a physical floppy diskette into cannot be located by increasingly sophisticated pieces of expensive hardware.

With four attendees at the ARGH! interest group meeting last conference, perhaps energies should be folded into Reference Interest Group --RIG, until a significant faction is willing to step forward to assume a leadership role in an Automated Resources Interest Group. More good could be accomplished by joining forces with RIG A motion will be presented at the 98 conference to disband (temporarily, at least) and merge with RIG.

CAYAS/CHILDRENS AND YOUNG ADULT SERVICES INTEREST GROUP
NANCY COLLINS-WARNER CHAIR

The work of this years bright and energetic CAYAS Board began at a sunny retreat in Seattle last June. The continuing education focus for the membership has resulted in a variety of workshops and programs:

• Fall 97 Workshop: Storytelling with Puppets (Tina Bixler)
  Offered in both Everett and Spokane; 58 participants; $880 profit to WLA
• Spring 98 Workshop/WLA Preconference: Serving Homeschoolers (David Bostrom, author of A Guide to Homeschooling for Librarians)
• 1998 WLA Conference Programs:
  Parables with Punch (Margaret Read MacDonald /storytelling)
  CAYAS Author Breakfast (Gary Soto) +2nd Visionary Award presentation
  Help Wanted-Due Tomorrow (EvieWilson-Lingbloom/YA Services)
  Fight the Power - Ideology & Childrens Literature (Mickey Gallagher)
  Performance Appraisal - Managers Challenge (Dr. Crystal Own)
  

CAYAS has also co-sponsored with the Intellectual Freedom IG On the Frontline- Intellectual Freedom & Customer Service (Candy Morgan & Mike Wessells) in Pasco, Vancouver and Spokane. We will again be the WLA presence at the Washington Homeschool Organization convention in Bellevue in May.

In support of the long term vitality of our Interest Group, the work of the CAYAS Board has included bringing our activities and financial resources into alignment (size and number of newsletters; Board meetings); encouraging the WLA Board to update the WLMA reciprocal membership agreement; looking at Advocating Access: Developing Community Library Services for Children and Young Adults in Washington State, the basic service standards publication done almost 10 years ago for possible revision; in cooperation with our UW GLIS representative doing the groundwork for a CAYAS webpage; and making proactive efforts to sustain and build on our membership base.

CDIG/COLLECTION DEVELOPMENT INTEREST GROUP
JACKIE YOUNGBLOOD, CHAIR

CDIG organized programs for the 1998 conference. There are two programs scheduled:

• Sixty in Ninety: Small Press Books-Brief pithy book talks on sixty books selected from those exhibited in the Small Press display.
• Table Talks: Collection Management Issues Join your colleagues in discussions about a)balancing the collection; b)effective replacement of materials as you weed; c) whats in a YA collection and d)developing collections in languages other than English.

Attempts were made to confirm a speaker for a session on current issues in video selection. None was found for this conference. However, Randy Pittman of the Video Librarian has agreed to present at the 1999 conference.

One issue of the CDIG newsletter was published in Summer, 1997.

DOCSER/DOCUMENTS AND SERIALS INTEREST GROUP
LINDA FREDERICKS, CHAIR

DOCSER was not very active this year for reasons discussed below. I talked with Cam McIntosh from the Census Bureau, and she will be giving a program on Census 2000 information and Census Bureau web pages at the 1998 Annual WLA conference.

DOCSER is VERY small, just a few members. Most documents librarians, etc. don't belong to DOCSER because they don't want to pay to join WLA (theres a long history here, before I got involved) This is probably the same for serials people. When I discussed the status of DOCSER with a group of Depository librarians in the region last year, the majority of attendants said they have no intention of joining DOCSER. As a result of this discussion the group is in the process of starting up a new government information group called the Northwest Government Information Network. The bottom line is that I think the group is headed for inactive status. Serials people perhaps can be a part of the Technology IG and Documents people could be part of the Reference or Technology IGS.

At this point I do not have a Vice-Chair and when I emailed the small group on my list recently, I received messages back from half of them saying they were no longer a part of the group. I feel that I inherited a close-to-dead horse. (I was one of three people who attended the annual business meeting -the out-going Chair, a Past-Chair and the newly-elected Chair by default - me.

I will not be attending this years WLA Annual Conference because it conflicts with a Depository conference I will be attending in Washington, DC. Unfortunately, the DOCSER Business Meeting is on the conference program. I will notify the appropriate people about this situation. The last two years I have attended this meeting have been sparsely attended (2-4 people).

A less-than-positive picture, I'm sorry to report.

IFIG/INTELLECTUAL FREEDOM INTEREST GROUP
MIKE WESSELLS, CHAIR

The major activity of IFIG this year has been a series of workshops entitled On the Frontline: Intellectual Freedom and Customer Service presented by Candy Morgan of Fort Vancouver Regional Library and myself (Timberland Regional) in Pasco, Vancouver, and Marysville, with Spokane to come in June. We covered the constitutional basis of Intellectual Freedom issues, why people complain, and how staff deal with concerned or irate patrons. Several attendees have asked if we could come and do this for the rest of their staff. There seems a real need for training programs for frontline staff -hooray for WLA for providing them. Kudos to Kathy Blinkwitz of Sno-Isle for serving as Program Chair and organizing the workshops. We are both new this year and making things up as we are going along, but she came through like gangbusters. Of course the secret agent of success is Gail Willis, who brought us along like the champ she is.

Communication with interest group members is a vital concern, and the change of leadership in all arenas includes a new editor for the newsletter, Jinny Burns of Elma Timberland Library. She is putting together the newsletter as we speak and will be out before conference.

These activities highlight my two continuing goals: to encourage communication between members and to provide training and awareness about intellectual freedom among frontline customer service library staff who may not have opportunities to attend annual conference.

ILL/INTERLIBRARY LOAN INTEREST GROUP
TROY CHRISTENSON, CHAIR

The WLA-ILLIG has had great year. Troy Christenson, chair of the ILLIG attended the Workshop on Workshops and the WLA annual retreat that gained fellowship, contacts and an understanding of the WLA organization at the executive level.

The Annual Spring Meeting was held in Leavenworth and had a tremendous turnout. This meeting had presentations on the World Wide Web (WWW), what is happening at the state level for combined collection databases and reference assistance and the new ILL standards at the international level.

There was a WLA ILL Western Washington Fall Meeting in the San Juan Island Library September 29, 1997. There were 25 attendees from the western region that attended. Chris Kernick-Fletcher spoke on genealogy, Rick Newell spoke on changes at WLN, Laurie Blakely spoke on ARIEL and there was a discussion on factors that are happening in ILL offices. See the online newsletter for a full write-up of the meeting by Linda Barnhart.

A home page has been created and is now available at WLA Online. The first online newsletter for the ILLIG is also available on the web at http:/WLA Online. Copies will be mailed to those who do not have an E-mail address listed in the membership list.

A breakfast has been scheduled at the WLA annual conference in Wenatchee for Friday April 17, 1998 at 8:00 a.m. for ILL folks desiring roundtable discussion.

Planning for the 1998 annual meeting is underway and is scheduled for the Doubletree in Wenatchee on March 23, 1998. Featured speakers are Karen Goettling and Barbara Pearson of the Washington State Library. Laurie Blakely is in charge of those arrangements.

Thank you all for making this year one of the best ever!

LIT/LITERACY INTEREST GROUP
DIANE COWLES, CHAIR

Good Choices for ESL Workshop--A Recap: We pulled it off! The long awaited workshop on collection development which we had to cancel previously for lack of participants did actually get off the ground this Fall. We met on Friday, October 3, 1997, at the Rainier Beach Library in Seattle. It was redesigned to focus on ESL collection development.

In it, we tried to cover items especially of interest to library staff working with patrons who are facing increasing need for more citizenship and job information, as well as English language learning in both print and non-print formats.

Ann Tippit, who teaches ESL at Seattle Central Community College gave an overview of the best ESL materials, publishers and sources, while also explaining the ESL collection development process she conceived with Seattle Public Library.

The City of Seattles New Americans Citizenship Project, which focuses on information and referral to all kinds of citizenship programs and access to current INS information was presented by Emily Wong, ESL Coordinator at Seattle Public Library.

After lunch, 2 computer based ESL programs which have been loaded onto the public access PCs at Rainier Beach Librarys Computer Lab was demonstrated by Bobbie Daniel and Pamela Wilkins, Rainier Beach Library staff.

Lastly, Aviva Ferman, who is an ESL teacher and former computer programmer, taught techniques for adapting existing computer programs for use with ESL tutoring.

The 20 attendees overwhelmingly stated that their expectations were met by the scope of this workshop and were able to take away specific ideas to use at their library.

We received a WLA CE grant for this workshop and actually made a profit for WLA.

The LIT program for the 1998 WLA conference is well suited to the overall theme. Out program is entitled "Help Please: Facilitating Library Interactions with Limited English Speakers." It will be held on April 16, 1998 from 10:15-11:30 a.m. Presenting the workshop will be Elisabeth Mitchell, an experienced ESLteacher who has worked with library family literacy programs. She is well qualified to conduct this workshop, having had many interactions with immigrant and refugee families in the course of her work and study. Examining modes of communication, library lingo, suggestions for conveying difficult ideas conceptually are all part of this very practical workshop.

Two special mailings were sent to LIT members: an alert to the international TESOL Conference held in Seattle, March 18-20, 1998 and one newsletter in early Spring. The LIT Annual meeting will be held at Conference on April 16th.

PRF/PUBLIC RELATIONS FORUM
MARY KELLY/CHAIR

The PR Forum strives to raise the level of library public relations expertise and awareness among library professionals. In 1997, the PR Forum initiated a regular column in the WLA publication Alki. The column focuses on community relations and community outreach in libraries. The inaugural piece appeared in the Summer, 1997 issue. In addition, the interest group hosted its annual Swap & Shop and Best of Show at the WLA's annual conference. This is an opportunity for libraries around the state to display and distribute samples of their printed materials.

RIG/REFERENCE INTEREST GROUP
COLLEEN BRAZIL, CHAIR

Late in 1997 Colleen Brazil was elected RIG chair after the chair had been vacant for some time. Program proposals for the 1998 Conference had already been submitted. RIG will sponsor Ride the Wave: Start Your Own Internet Volunteer Program and will co-sponsor with CAYAS, 3 O'Clock High-Assignment Due Tomorrow Parts 1 and 2. Planning for them began in late 1997.

SRRT/SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITIES ROUND TABLE
SHIRLEY LEWIS, CHAIR

Newsletter editor Konny Thompson produced a SRRT newsletter in the winter of 1997. SRRT plans to do another newsletter in spring 1998.

SRRT is working on a conference program on unions in libraries for the 1998 WLA conference. The program features a panel of library employees. Discussion will explore the status of labor unions in libraries in Washington state.

TSIG/TECHNICAL SERVICES INTEREST GROUP
DANIEL CANNCASCIATO, CHAIR

This has been a year of very low activity for TSIG. We have organized one program for the annual conference in April (regarding an interesting and significant event in the world of cataloging), but not much else. There have been preliminary investigations into co-sponsoring with OCLC an authorities format workshop in the eastern part of the state. The presenter of that workshop (who is also currently the TSIG chair), will continue to try to make this happen later this calendar year.

USER ED/USER EDUCATION INTEREST GROUP
ELLA M. MELIK/ANN REED CO-CHAIRS

If this report is short it is because there really is not much to report on this year. In the summer of '97, Ann Reed and Ella Melik volunteered to co-chair the group, which had previously been inactive for some time, in order to revive it.

With the increase in the use of electronic information products creating an upsurge in the need for user education in public, school and academic libraries in the past several years, the need for librarians involved with user education to get together on a regular basis to share ideas and problem solve is greater than ever. We envisioned User Ed doing more than meeting once a year for an annual conference program, by providing a forum for members to discuss issues, share information, exchange ideas and learn from visiting libraries across the state on a regual basis, about six time during the year. As a result of technical difficulties with our email, we were unable to get the forum series off the ground this year.

The topic of the annual conference program is one that we hope will spark some interest from librarians in both academic and public libraries: "Teaching the Internet in the public library: What can we learn from User Education programs in academic and school libraries?"

We plan to capitalize on the conference program to launch the idea of the user ed forums for next year.

WALE/WASHINGTON ASSOCIATION OF LIBRARY EMPLOYEES
PAT KENNEDY, CHAIR

CONFERENCE: The annual WALE Conference is the biggest and most time consuming activity that WALE sponsors. The conference covers three days in October and is held in various towns throughout Washington State. This year's conference was held at the DoubleTree Hotel in Spokane. Conference chairs were Gina Rice, Kristie Kirkpatrick and Sue Anderson. They had over 20 volunteers who donated their time to making the conference a success. This year 250 people attended the conference, of these 102 were WALE or WLA members. Clearly this is a place to gain members for WLA. This was the first year that WALE presented a pre-conference workshop which was titled "Hands-on Mending". Ruth Poynter and Pauline Taylor from the King County Library System were the presenters. A profit of $105 was made.

The rest of the conference consisted of three main speakers, Jess Walter, Kathleen Weibel and Nancy Pearl. There were seven breakout sessions. Our only problem was that Kathleen Weibel would not sign a contract and would not get her information to us. In fact, we explored the idea of replacing her and went so far as to arrange for someone else to speak as a backup in case she did not show up. I will say that she did not take a speaker's fee but instead asked WALE to use that money to help two people attend who could not have otherwise come.

After all the expenses were paid including the $4000 seed money from WLA, the WALE Conference mad a net profit of $4,430.40 which was returned to WLA. As will all conferences, there were things that we all would have done differently, but as whole the conference was very well organized. By having it in Spokane, we reached people who might not have otherwise attended. The DoubleTree Hotel was easy to work with and very efficient.

MONTANA SUPPORT STAFF: We were contacted by several people from Montana who were interested in starting a Support Staff organization. We invited them to attend the conference in Spokane and five of them attended. They go an overall view of the WALE conference and also had some questions answered. Hopefully they will be able to organize a group for Montana Library Employees.

1998 CONFERENCE: Plans for the 1998 Conference are well underway. The theme is Twenty-five Years, Catch the Spirit. Arrangements for the speakers is almost complete. The' 98 Conference will be held at Lake Chelan, October 22-24. Conference Chairs are Kim Hixson and Michelle Dowdy from Fort Vancouver Regional Library.

STRATEGIC PLAN FOR WASHINGTON STATE LIBRARIES: The thrust of WALE is to gain more acceptance and respect in the library world and to open up opportunities for all support staff in the state. Therefore, as WALE Chair, I suggested a change in wording to the WSL plan for the future of libraries in Washington State to include all library employees. Nancy Zussy accepted this suggestion so the term Library Employees is used instead of Librarian.

SCHOLARSHIPS: Also, as WALE Chair and as a member of the scholarship committee, I participated in discussions with Tony Wilson to allow WLA scholarships to be used for distance learning programs for people to get their MLS. WALE is very conscious of the fact that members who live at some distance from the University of Washington cannot quit their jobs for two years because of financial or family responsibilities to attend the library school in Seattle. The change in the scholarship will allow WALE members to gain a MLS from alternative sources, and it does not discriminate against those who can attend the University of Washington.

FUTURE PLANS: Inquiries have already been made on sponsoring a workshop called "Leading From Any Position". This workshop was presented several years ago with great response, and it was suggested to WALE that it be offered again. I have suggested to Sherry Braga, the incoming chair, that she may want to approach other interest groups to be co-sponsor. At this time, information on prices and the approach the workshop leader would take has been received, but no date has been determined.

WLA CONFERENCE: WALE arranged for Mark Weick to present a workshop at the WLA Conference in Wenatchee on "Violence in the Workshop." It will cover two workshop periods. WALE has provided him with various incidents of violence pertaining to libraries.

NEW OFFICERS: New officers for WALE will be elected at the WLA Conference in April.

WLFTA/WASHINGTON FRIENDS AND TRUSTEES ASSOCIATION INTEREST GROUP
KATHLEEN ARDREY, CHAIR

This report appears in the officer's report section.