MINUTES OF THE BOARD OF TRUSTEES OF THE PLATTEKILL PUBLIC LIBRARY: JANUARY, 2018

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Amended (2/22/18)

Plattekill Public Library

Board of Trustees

January 11, 2018

           

The meeting was called to order at 7:00 PM with the Pledge of Allegiance.

 

Present were: Lynne Ridgeway, President; Valerie Smith, Vice President; Karen Adamson, Trustee; Will Farrell, Trustee; Joe Egan, Trustee; Luz Ledesma, Trustee;  John Georghiou, Director; Barbara Jacobini, Treasurer; Donna Ebanks, Secretary

 

Excused: David Padilla

 

Public: SUT reporter, Mark Reynolds; Councilman Darryl Matthews; Councilman Dean DePew, and Laura Dougherty.

 

Public Comment:

Mr. DePew suggested the Library Board reserve the Community Room beneath the Library for their monthly Board meeting as it is larger space than the Library and will better accommodate members of the public.  He then introduced newly elected Town Board member Darryl Matthews who will be serving as Town Board liaison to the Library.  Mr. DePew inquired about the Library’s status on the potential purchase of the current library property. Lynne said that the engineer’s report was recently delivered to the Library’s attorney and is under discussion. Mr. DePew requested to know if the agenda item “approve salaries of staff,” is an approval of the salaries as they were presented in the approved budget or if they had changed since that time.  John explained that the salary line item has not changed, and the salary adjustments were within the budget parameters of what was established.  John noted that the salary line item may change in the future as the Library’s needs change. Joe questioned the validity of raises in respect to no changes to the salary line item as presented in the approved budget. Valerie replied that when the Board votes on the salary line item, it is not specific to individual employees and that the Board sets an amount for salaries. Lynne further explained that there would not be any changes to the salary line item, only changes of the distribution of the funds within that line item; Luz concurred with that explanation.

 

Mark Reynolds asked if Lynne, Valerie, and Karen, voted no to vetting the current library property at the time of a Board vote. Lynne replied that this was incorrect. Will said that they (Lynne, Valerie, and Karen) had voted no to moving forward.  Valerie said that there are different understandings of what moving ahead consists of.  Mark also asked if the Board is in favor of acquiring the current Library property.  Valerie explained that the Board is still in the process of performing their due diligence. Joe noted that the process for the potential purchase of the current library property is being done in a dissimilar fashion to how the Board organized their procedure for the potential purchase of the Cider Mill property. The Board engaged in further discussions regarding the differences in the ways the current Library property and the Cider Mill property were vetted. 

Mark also asked the Board the status of the $9, 250 deposit money.  Lynne said they have not heard from the Library’s attorney regarding this matter.

 

Correspondence:

None

Secretary’s Report:

 

→        Motion to accept the December 14, 2017 regular Board meeting minutes as amended to include three amendments  was made by Luz Ledesma and seconded by Karen Adamson.  All were in favor.

 

Joe requested that the December 14th minutes be amended to include the following statement:

Joe stated that documents Board members receive are not presented in a timely manner and the Board is getting everything backwards, without having seen the revisions.

 

Valerie requested that the December 14th minutes be amended to include the following statement:

Valerie stated that the documents referred to in Joe’s statement were in fact first presented in September, and a draft was presented to the Board for through discussion at a previous meeting and then thoroughly explained at the last meeting.

 

Lynne requested that the December 14th minutes be amended to include the following statement:

Valerie said the final draft of the document in question would be the same as the strikeout version.

 

Financial Report:

Barbara reviewed the financial report for the Board.

Items of note:

·       The library received some undesignated donations; discussion determined these funds would be used for summer programming events.

 

7:57pm – Joe Egan left Board meeting to attend the Town Zoning Board meeting.

 

·       Disclosure of conflict of interest forms must be signed and returned to Barbara.

·       Letter of engagement was received from Nugent & Haeussler and will be signed by John and Lynne.

·       Regarding the Library’s Contingency Fund Policy: The OSC said the Library can put money into the Capital fund provided the money is budgeted for. 

 

→  Motion to approve the December payroll was made by Karen Adamson and seconded by

      Luz Ledesma; all others were in favor.

→  Motion to approve the checks pending audit was made by Karen Adamson and seconded by Luz Ledesma; all others were in favor.

     

→  Motion to approve payment in advance of audit for the 2018 payroll and 2018 Central Hudson bills was made by Will Farrell and seconded by Luz Ledesma; all others were in favor.

 

→  Motion to approve hiring Nugent & Haeussler to complete the 2017 AUD, and 990 reports was made by Will Farrell and seconded by Karen Adamson; all others were in favor.

 

→  Motion to approve unused sick time benefits through payroll was made by Karen Adamson and seconded by Luz Ledesma; all others were in favor.

 

The Approval of major Budget line items motion was tabled.

 

Warrant of checks was circulated for signatures.

 

Director’s Report:

Was read and discussed.

 

Will said that he spoke with Assemblyman Kevin Cahill’s office and their representative would like to come to the Library to discuss grant funding. Will had a conversation with a representative of Senator Larkin’s office as well and was given links to websites that may have grants the Library is eligible for.

 

John noted that the weeding project is continuing to move ahead through the Adult Fiction and Books on CD sections.

 

John reported that through the MHLS Sustainable Library’s project, member libraries have been offered an energy assessment of their buildings at a starting cost of $875; John will contact MHLS for details.

 

The Board discussed a letter of proposal from Dr. Katherine J. Beinkafner, Ph.D., to perform water testing of the current Library building.

 

→        Motion to approve the money needed for Dr. Beinkafner to test the water at the current Library building for a cost not exceeding $1725. was made by Will Farrell and seconded by Luz Ledesma; all in favor.

 

Committee Reports:

None

           

Unfinished Business:

The approved Committee Appointments list was distributed as amended.

 

New Business:

 

→        Motion to approve the month of February 2018 as Food for Fines month was made by Valerie Smith and seconded by Karen Adamson; all others were in favor.

 

Annual Review of Policies: Lynne will be emailing all Board member policies to review and then discuss at the February Board meeting.

 

No Friends liaison report was available as they did not meet in January.

 

Approval of staff salaries item from the Director’s report was tabled as there was not a quorum at that time.

 

→        Motion to enter into Executive Session at 8:35pm with the Director’s participation to a have a discussion about matters involving potential litigation, a real estate transaction that may affect its value and without the Director’s participation to discuss a personnel matter involving salary adjustment about a specific individual was made by Valerie Smith and seconded by Karen Adamson; all others were in favor.

 

Executive session was delayed in order to respond to questions from Mark Reynolds. The Board engaged in a discussion regarding the question of a possibility of conflict of interest in retaining Dr. Beinkafner to perform the water testing as she sits on the Town Planning Board. Mr. DePew suggested the Board have Dr. Beinkafner sign a non-collusion form.  Mr. Matthews added that he recently participated in instruction provided by the State on determining a conflict of interest, and he would provide the Board with a copy of the process The Board generally agreed that a non-collusion form would be appropriate and will investigate further.

 

Executive session officially began at 8:44pm.

 

The Board came out of Executive Session at 9:15pm. 

           

Adjournment:

The Board then adjourned at 9:15pm

                                                                                                                                   

Respectfully submitted by:

Donna Ebanks

Secretary