Author: Eric Melton

I have started to withdraw the 2012 magazines.  Some will be bundled and placed in the commons area to be sold.  Each bundle will be sold for $2.00.  Money collected from the sale of magazine bundles should be placed in the foundation bag.

A link to a directory of staff meeting minutes has now been added in the Staff Resources & Training menu (to the left) of the intranet. 2013 minutes and all future minutes will be available there.

Eric

For those of you unable to attend yesterday’s staff meeting, the yellow notepads at the reference, youth services, and circulation desks are intended for any kind of patron comments you feel are worth noting. These could be compliments, complaints, or suggestions. I would also like to know when a patron was denied something because of an existing policy or procedure (you can exclude notes regarding requiring an ID for checkout or registering for a new card as those policies are not going to change). 

Eric

It’s hard to come up with a title to this little missive.  Where do I start?  It’s been such a pleasure and a privilege to work in such a very fine library like JPL for these past 7 1/2 years.  I am beyond grateful for the opportunities I was given, the wonderful people that I worked with, and the fine patrons that I was able to help in any small way.  Please know what a big part this job and place have played in my life, and how many treasured friendships I have developed.  Your deep commitment to your jobs, your patrons, and the community we serve is beyond measure.  Please continue to remember these two words–“care” and “communicate”.  They have been my guiding light and will continue to make this place the wonderful asset that it is today. 

A special thanks for your very wonderful and generous gifts from this morning.  I will treasure the wall hanging, and look forward to the opportunity to go to one of my favorite entertainment venues for some great theater or music.  The hard work on the entertainment at the staff meeting was so worth it, Ladies–I loved the skit!!  Great food, great entertainment–what more can you ask for?!

After my month in the sun (leaving January 31), I will be back and ready to volunteer–no dusting please!  In the meantime, thanks for all your kind words and thoughts. Feel free to call me on my cell, text me, be my friend on facebook, or email me at rita.samuelson@gmail.com.

With much gratitude,

Rita

Paper requests from patrons for items for ILLs (interlibrary loans) can be placed in the wire basket Maurine’s desk.

Remember, all ILL request can also be placed from the intranet by staff.  Look in the upper left section of the intranet and you will find “Purchase/ILL Request” link.

Just a reminder that we have a staff meeting tomorrow at 8am. There will be singing and maybe dancing!

Eric

Please remember to turn in your timesheet today, Wednesday 1/22! 

Thank you!

Missy

The employees listed below will be communicating with the public via email so have been given JPL email addresses. If there are others you think need a JPL address let me know.

Eric

estevens@johnstonlibrary.com

schwebach@johnstonlibrary.com

start@johnstonlibrary.com

cogil@johnstonlibrary.com

young@johnstonlibrary.com

kuhn@johnstonlibrary.com

Patrons looking to pick up hard copies of state tax forms need to go to the Hoover Building at E 12th & Capital or online at www.state.ia.us/tax. Patrons needing federal forms W-2, W-3, W-4 or 1099 can go to the Federal Building at 210 Walnut. Patrons can also try local office supply stores. The library cannot order or print these forms. Our available tax forms are displayed in the copy center area.

We will no longer fill out a yellow payment slip as customers pay for lost/damage items.   Payments for lost items are still to be entered in the cash register as ‘Replacement’.  The total amount (replacement plus processing fee) can be entered as a single total, you do not have to enter the cost of the item and the $5.00 processing fee separately. 

For those interested, I’ve added a link to a directory of Library Board documents (minutes, agendas, etc.) under the Staff Resources & Training menu. 

Eric

You’ve likely noticed holds coming in for accounts set up to receive notices by text. These notices are sent at the same interval as email notices. In Patron Registration, you may also have noticed the option to send a text message in addition to sending notices via some other notification method. This would allow a patron to receive a text message as well as an email or phone call. Please let Rita or I know if you questions about text notices.

Eric

Hello!

Please remember to turn in your timesheet today!  Don’t forget we had a holiday to figure in last Wednesday-New Year’s Day.

Thanks for your help,

Missy

JANUARY TABLE DISPLAYS

Weight loss help (table between the reference & circ desks)

Exercise and Fitness (table by new books)

Notable Books of 2013 – Fiction, Poetry, and nonfiction (display cabinet at circ desk)

Cookbooks (display cabinet by the cookbook nonfiction section)

• Open a check-in window
• Check the items in that you’d like to display
• Select all of the items you’d like to display by holding the Shift or Ctrl keys (see image below)

• Click the “Manage Item” button at the top of the screen
• Check the “Shelf location” checkbox and select “On Display”
• Save
  

The Library Board and city council have approved the hiring of Dreama Deskins as our new IT & Circulation Support Librarian. As you know, Dreama has been helping catalog materials and maintain information technology systems here at JPL for several years. Her experience (here and in a wide variety of other library settings) developing technology plans and optimizing workflows, providing instruction on a range of topics, and leading a variety of other kinds of initiatives will be a great asset to the Johnston Public Library in the years to come. Dreama will need several weeks to wind-down her consulting work for other area libraries so she won’t begin work until sometime in March. She’s asked that staff be discreet about this news until next Monday -by then she’ll have notified her clients of her intentions. Please let me know if you have any questions.

Eric

I’ve gathered the tutorials posted recently on the intranet under the “Staff Resources and Training” menu. A new tutorial has also been added titled “Polaris Search Tips” -please check it out.

Eric

Polaris Search Tips

All tips assume you’re searching either item or bibliographic records using the search options shown below:

Limit by material type

• For Books on CD add “cd book” to the end of your search (e.g. “peter pan cd book”) 
• For DVDs add “dvd” to your search (e.g. “peter pan dvd”)
• For Blu-Rays add “blu-ray” to your search (e.g. “peter pan blu-ray”)

Combine title and author to narrow your results (e.g. “grisham innocent”)

Use wild cards in between, in front of, or at the end of words

• To find items with particular call numbers (e.g. “DVD*FAMILY”)
• To search for terms with unknown endings (e.g. “frog*”)
• To search for patrons or items whose names you’re unsure of (e.g. “Peter Brog*”)

Our last in-transit delivery between JPL and UPL was done on 12-30-13.  Any Urbandale items that are returned here from now on should be treated as any other open access item; i.e. marked with a pink delivery slip, noted on the clipboard and placed in the box for pick up by the AEA delivery van.  If there are several UPL items, we may want to put them together in a box to help the driver out. 

Rita

Here are the details for our Holiday Party!!!!

When:  Saturday, January 11th

Time:  6:00 PM

Location:  The Tavern II

               1755 50th Street

               West Des Moines, IA 50266

We will be ordering off the menu.  NO buffet, based on popular choice.

We are inviting staff members who have left employment within the last year to our party, again based on popular choice. 

I will need your RSVP as soon as possible as I need to call the restaurant a couple days ahead with the number of folks attending, so they can set the room.  A few have already sent their RSVPs to me. 

Let me know by email, text, verbal, etc. 

Any questions, let me know!!

Jo