Local Holds Workgroup Notes
May 17, 2022, 10:30 am
Phone/video conference (Zoom)
Goal: Identify factors and identify ways to address them, including data (by June ILS Committee meeting)
Present: Erin Foley (ACL) Cluster 1, Renee Daley (ROM) Cluster 1, Lindsey Ganz (COL) Cluster 2, Eddie Glade (PCPL) Cluster 4, Meagan Statz (PDS) Cluster 5, Jill Porter (MFD) Cluster 6, Heidi Cox (MCF) Cluster 7, Bailey Anderson (BER) Cluster 8, Nate Snortum (DCL) Cluster 9-10, Margie Navarre-Saaf, Michael Spelman, Molly Warren, Susan Lee, (MPL) Cluster 11-13.
Absent: Kendra Kimball (WID) Cluster 2
Excused: None
Recorder: Michelle Karls (SCLS)
SCLS Staff Present: Vicki Teal Lovely, Amy Gannaway, Heidi Oliversen, Cindy Weber, Tim Drexler.
Meeting Documents:
1. Call to Order at 10:33 am.
a. Introduction of guests/visitors. None.
b. Changes/Additions to the Agenda. None.
2. Approval of previous meeting notes: 5/3/2022, review at next meeting
3. Action Items
a. Charge:
i. Original: Examine the issues with allowing a local holds only policy and provide information and/or data to address issues
ii. Revised: Examine the factors involved with implementing a local-holds and local-use-only policy for new materials. Gather information to assist with this charge
1. Motion: S. Lee moved approval of the revised workgroup charge. J. Porter seconded.
2. Discussion: V. Teal Lovely reviewed the proposed revised charge to the workgroup.
3. Vote: motion carried.
4. Discussion
a. Review parameters discussion from 5/10 Circulation Services Subcommittee
i. Discussion: The CSS recommended the Local Holds Workgroup should determine the parameters of the project. (Formats, Item Types, new Collection Code, etc.)? 14 day loan period for new adult books has been suggested by various groups. Separate Item Type for 7 day new DVDs. We need to create new Item Types because we already have items in the system using existing the Item Types and different Item Types it will be necessary for different circulation rules and separate statistics for this project.
b. Review known concerns and discuss data dimensions
i. ILS Staff have met to discuss how to gather data for all of the following concerns. They looked for existing reports that have previous year’s data to help establish a baseline. We will be looking for trends over time.
ii. T. Drexler is covering the first 3 topics.
iii. Will the time for holds to be filled increase?; (Tim)
1. We have Library Statistics Summary reports that can be used for Total Loaned and Borrowed comparisons to establish a baseline with pre-local holds pilot lending/borrowing ratios. This will be monitored to determine if there are significant changes. T. Drexler displayed a graph he made in Tableau with a few months of data.
iv. Will patrons have to wait longer for items not owned by the library?
1. Holds filled latency report may be used determine if it’s taking longer to fill holds during local holds pilot. T. Drexler created a graph using data from this report, which displays how long it currently takes to fill active holds. We might see increases in the number of days displayed as bumps farther out on this graph if it turns out the hold wait times are increasing. This data includes holds that were suspended and were activated by a patron, which explains some of the very long numbers of wait days in this report. We cannot tell when a hold was activated. From the data, it looks like the vast majority of holds are filled within 7 days. Patrons often use their hold list as a “To Be Read” list. C. Weber will look into this but is unsure if there is a way to determine the hold activation date. The system doesn’t retain the date the hold is suspended or unsuspended. What about holds that are never picked up? There are so many factors that go into holds data that it may be hard to tell
v. Will total loaned/borrowing change as a result of the pilot? Will libraries who are not participating be affected?
1. Total Loaned and Borrowed/Stats Summary (check percentage of CKO by library’s own collection).
a. Discussion: T. Drexler mentioned the Total Loaned and Borrowed information on the Stat Summary spreadsheet.
vi. Will circulation go down?
1. Look at circ data for BKA14/BKA28 and DVD7/DVD28 data – show trend of historical data by library.
a. Discussion: We would be using the monthly Circulation report. Can we limit it to new items? Adult books and Adult DVDs that are considered the “new items”. Circulation by owner report could also be helpful. E. Glade asked if there was a way to see if patrons are using local holds materials and then cancelling their holds.
vii. Will items sit on the shelf that would otherwise be filling holds at other libraries? (Cindy and Heidi)
1. Discussion: We will want to check to see if items with the project Item Types are sitting on the shelf (not on hold, not checked out, status of Available as long as there were other holds). C. Weber has started working on this but is not finished yet. We would run this report daily to get snapshots of the data and get an idea of what is moving off the shelf for local use.
viii. Will libraries need to purchase more copies and increase their materials budgets?
1. Suggestions from workgroup members
2. Purchase alert might be an option. Could we look at how many titles a particular library has had on the purchase alert over time to see if there is a change?
a. Discussion: We don’t know the answer yet. Libraries will assign item types and a status to cause items stay in your library to fill local holds/walk-in checkouts for a certain period of time (this group would decide that). Libraries should continue to purchase items as they normally would. Can MAD share with their branches? STP has asked about this and we don’t think this will work because it’s specific for location codes. We could try testing to see if there is a way to group them. Clustering might be beneficial. H. Oliversen will double-check the permissions and ask LibLime about this. M. Warren said we haven’t updated the SCID formula in many years so we might want to look at it to see if it needs to be updated.
ix. Will this cause an Erosion of resource sharing system-wide?
1. Discussion: Could this delay/reduce resource sharing? Is there a way to measure impact on transportation costs? This is something we can add to the list, we may not know that from the pilot but perhaps afterward.
2. What will the patron perception be? We could create a form where libraries could report those instances of patron frustration. How will reimbursement for cross county borrowing be affected for Dane County libraries?
x. This is adding another layer of collection management and processing.
1. Discussion: We are less certain about data for this, but we will work out processes using the batch item edit tool. M. Warren mentioned that problem with staff answering questions and the item is sitting on a shelf and patrons have been trained to place a hold.
xi. The survey closes on Friday. We will review it for any other topics we want to add to the list when thinking about data.
5. Review Timeline
1. April
6, ILS Committee discuss project and approve forming a work group
2. Form
work group to identify issues to study (including data)
3. May
3, Work group meets
4. May
10, Circulation Services Subcommittee: discuss parameters for pilot
5. May
17, Work Group meets
6. May 19, All Directors—update on project
7. May 24, Work Group meets
8. June 1, ILS Committee vote on pilot project (June 15 through December 30)
9. If pilot is approved, the project progresses as follows
10. Recruit pilot project participants and begin setup
11. June 15, Pilot project begins
12. Work group continues to meet to study issues through November 30
13. July 21, All Directors—update on project
14. October 5, ILS Committee decides if vote should be done by ILS Committee cluster reps at November 17 All Director’s meeting or December 7 ILS Committee
15. November 17 All Directors meeting: Work group provide information on project
16. November 17 or December 7 vote
17. December 30, pilot ends
a. Discussion: V. Teal Lovely reviewed timeline. Thursday there will be an update at the All Directors meeting. The survey is closing on Friday. V. Teal Lovely wanted to mention the Multi-part DVD vote coming up and we will be making changes to the way we handle DVDs. Due to this, V. Teal Lovely would recommend sticking with just books for the pilot project.
6. Plan for Next meeting:
a. May 24, 1 pm
i. Review survey results
ii. Identify top concerns and top benefits (factors)
iii. Identify data dimensions
iv. Identify parameters for proposed pilot present to (Circulation Services Subcommittee)
1. All libraries or some libraries
a. SCLS suggests all libraries participate
2. Select new titles or all new titles
a. SCLS suggest a select group of titles with an identified “normal” group of titles for comparison
3. All formats or select formats
4. Length of loan (Item loan type)
a. The parameter that has been suggested by some libraries is 14 days
b. Length of time materials are held for local holds:
i. 30, 60 or 90 days (Reduced Transportation holds is 60 days)
v. Prepare information for ILS Committee
7. Adjournment at 11:45 am.
For more information about the Local Holds Workgroup, contact Vicki Teal Lovely.
SCLS staff are available to attend cluster meetings to share information and answer questions pertaining to this committee meeting and other departmental projects.
Local Holds Workgroup/Notes/5-17-2022