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Cheery Friday Greetings,
Advocacy. An Illinois colleague who focused on advocacy once said that if you have two people, you have politics. He said that a lot, actually! It is nice to be back from the world of progressive rock to the familiar world of New York State budget-related politics!
Indeed, the one-house budgets of the NYS Assembly and Senate have been released.
While the Governor’s executive budget includes $102.1M for libraries, an increase of $3M over the current year, the Assembly and Senate one-house budgets add an additional.2.5M for a total of $104.6M. Both budgets also include $11/student for school library materials and $3M for NOVELny. The executive budget contains $34M for construction aid for public libraries; the Assembly increases it to $68M and the Senate to $54M.
We must advocate for the largest amounts of funding for each item. Contact your legislators via the New York Library Association's website -- click here, enter your information, and you will receive suggested text to personalize and send. Their Advocacy section also contains everything you need to know about the state budget and legislative priorities.
If you prefer to send a personalized email outside of the NYLA portal, you can find email addresses for your legislators in the SCRLC Representatives and Senators section of our Advocacy page.
Board Meeting. The Board met this morning and:
- Accomplished the more routine tasks like reviewing the financial reports from January and February, as well as the advisory committee minutes and the report that the staff and I prepare.
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Approved bereavement leave language in the Employee Handbook to broaden and make it more inclusive when determining who is a family member. If anyone else is needing to do this work, I would be happy to share the language with you.
- Voted to support the Institute for Racial Equity Advancement in Libraries (iREAL). This is an initiative led by Binghamton University in conjunction with CUNY and Rutgers “to enable academic library workers to develop the skills and expertise necessary to lead organizational culture change towards providing a more welcoming environment for BIPOC communities on campus.” The Board approved supporting it to $3,000 and may do more at the end of the FY.
- Brainstormed ideas for the next Board retreat, deciding to spend the time learning about the challenges and innovations happening in each sector of membership, i.e., schools, academics, corporate, publics, hospitals, and SCHOAM (special collections, historical organizations, archives, and museums).
2024 Total Solar Eclipse. Mini-grant applications are due today! You have a few hours! The grants are designed to help cover costs of programming and activities associated with the April 8 total solar eclipse. These grants are funded by the American Astronomical Society's Jay M. Pasachoff Solar Eclipse Mini-Grants Program, which awarded a grant to SCRLC. See, too, below--there are also 35 eclipse kits still available!
Speaking of the eclipse, this truly is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for most of our community residents (next one visible from NYS is May 1, 2079). It is disconcerting to think that babies born today will be in their mid-50’s! Even if we are besieged by cloud cover and relegated to observing online, the sky will still darken and evening birdsong will be heard, and in many places—especially at libraries—community members will be gathered together.
Many schools are releasing early (or off for the day) and even the local Wegmans is closing for a couple of hours to enable its workers to enjoy this event. SCRLC will close for the afternoon to enable staff to observe at 99% or to head to totality (and maybe to your library!).
For all things eclipse, see our Eclipse Resources for 2024 Guide, which also includes our archived webinars and a couple of interactive maps showing the percentage of totality from wherever you are. May we all have clear skies!
Yours in partnership,
Mary-Carol Lindbloom
Executive Director
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