The Virtual Library of Virginia
Steering Committee Meeting - Electronic Meeting
January and February 1998
MINUTES
The Steering Committee met on January 16 and handled a few items of general business. In addition, 2 renewal items were presented for approval via email on February 20, 1998.
PARTICIPANTS: Theresa Byrd, Gene Damon, Barbara Ford, Linda Farynk, Eileen Hitchingham, John Jaffe, Jean Major, Connie Kearns McCarthy, Barbara Miller, Roy Strohl, John Walsh, Elsie Stephens Weatherington, and Karin Wittenborg. Also: Kathy Perry.
A. FirstSearch Block Searches (Connie McCarthy)
The Steering Committee discussed the need for additional FirstSearch block searches. Because the Collections Committee would not be meeting for another week, the Steering Committee approved the additional purchase of block searches allowed in the budget reserve.
ACTION: The Steering Committee approved the purchase of 307,000 additional FirstSearch block searches at the current contractual rate/search.
B. Full-text RFP (Connie McCarthy)
The Steering Committee discussed the importance of price as one of the weighted criteria.
C. OCLC Letter and responses (Eileen Hitchingham)
Eileen and Kathy provided an update on the letter to OCLC (dated December 19, 1997) and OCLC's responses: the December 24 letter proposal on TCP/IP from Shirley Hyatt. Eileen reported it is difficult to evaluate the proposal pricing and that she had requested additional information from OCLC and Solinet to assist the Technical Issues Committee in evaluating the pricing. In particular, they would like to be able to compare the pricing with the VIVA institutions' current telecommunications costs.
ACTION: Eileen and Kathy will follow up.
D. Special Collections (Elsie Weatherington)
Elsie presented a request to use VIVA funds to hire a grant writer for the Virginia history timeline project. The five doctorals receiving money for Special Collections would need to transfer funds not to exceed $20,000 to University of Virginia for the grant writer. The project will be completed by June 1998.
ACTION: The Steering Committee approved the release of funds for the Heritage Project grant writer.
E. STAT-USA (Kathy Perry for Connie McCarthy)
Kathy presented the renewal of Stat-USA for the Steering Committee's approval via e-mail on February 20.
ACTION: The Steering Committee approved renewal of Stat-USA.
F. PCI-Web (Kathy Perry for Connie McCarthy)
Kathy presented the renewal of Chadwyck-Healey's PCI-Web for the Steering Committee's approval via e-mail on February 20. The Steering Committee requested further statistical information on VIVA use of this product. That information was obtained.
ACTION: The Steering Committee approved renewal of PCI-Web for another year.
G. Next Meeting: The Steering Committee agreed to meet on Wednesday, March 12 at the University of Richmond, prior
to the Collections Workshop and the Full-Text Vendor Presentations.
Contact: Kathy Perry (George Mason University), VIVA Director.
Posted: 4/24/98