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Tue, 1 Jun 1993 16:34:20 EST
Discussion of Government Document Issues <[log in to unmask]>
DLC Summary
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Summary, Spring Meeting
Depository Library Council
Washington, DC
May 17-18, 1993
MONDAY, MAY 17, 1993
The Spring 1993 Depository Library Council (DLC) meeting was
held May 17-18, 1993 in the Carl Hayden Room at the Government
Printing Office (GPO). Council members in attendance: Gary
Cornwell, Chair; Beth Duston, Chair-Elect; Susan Tulis, Secretary;
William Ellis; Carol Gordon; Sandy Morton-Schwalb; Robert Oakley;
Kay Schlueter; Jack Sulzer; Richard Varn; Mark Vonderhaar; and John
Weiner.
The meeting began with Council setting its goals and
objectives for this meeting. It was hoped that by working through
the draft document, "Alternatives for Restructuring the Depository
Library Program (DLP)," Council could move the discussion forward,
come up with some recommendations, and be able to issue the report
not as a draft but as report of Council.
Wayne Kelley, Superintendent of Documents, told us that this
meeting was important to GPO because of all the changes taking
place throughout the government. GPO staff would be carefully
listening to all that is said during this meeting. Library
Programs Service (LPS) will be having a retreat in June to talk
about what they are doing, their successes, their frustrations, and
discuss how they can improve on their performance based upon what
they have heard at this meeting and others.
Judy Russell, Director, LPS, updated us on GPO connecting to
the Internet. Commerce is in the process of installing an Internet
connection for its Electronic Bulletin Board. If it works for
Commerce, then GPO will copy them. The plan is to have telnet
access through the Internet to the bulletin board, allowing screen
capture and supporting kermit file transfer, but no FTP.
In response to a question, Ms. Russell stated that GPO will
accept the software for Phase 1 of ACSIS by the conclusion of this
fiscal year, after having had one full year of testing, use, and
debugging. There is no firm schedule for when phases 2 and 3 will
be in place. Phase 1 is already impacting GPO; the classifiers
have moved to the receiving area so they can work with the material
as it arrives. This change should expedite the processing as well
as identifying problems, such as shorts, and will provide more
timely opportunity to respond to them. Phase 2 deals with the
production of shipping lists and a by-product will be electronic
delivery of shipping lists. Testing on Phase 2 should begin Oct.
1, 1993. Phase 3 has to do with microfiche.
The breaking out of item numbers is being done by the
inspectors as time permits. There is, therefore, no target date
for when the 30 suggested items numbers might be broken out. At
this point it is hard to estimate if this will result in any cost
savings since LPS will still have to resurvey libraries. Ms.
Russell also mentioned another proposal being considered. It
appears in the May 15, 1993 Administrative Notes issue and deals
with the discontinuation of ephemeral materials such as
newsletters, preprints, reprints, and separates. She stressed that
this is just a proposal.
Russell Duncan, Graphic Systems Development Division, gave
Council a demonstration of a prototype online Congressional Record.
The software he demonstrated was Electronic Book Technology by
Dynatext. It was fairly sophisticated and supported a windows
application. The company had done some customization for GPO, such
as always showing you what page number you were on and who was
speaking. Standard Generalized Markup Language (SGML) was needed
so that sections within sections within sections could be located.
It is possible to limit a search request based on the SGML tags.
With a color monitor, the different types of material in the Record
appeared in different colors. Mr. Duncan said that it would be
possible to have it be different type faces if a color monitor was
not used. Tables are in there, but GPO hasn't figured out exactly
how they will be put in. It is also possible to cut and paste
portions, export portions, set up different screen views, and
different printer views. At present, GPO is working to make their
typesetting program accept SGML tags.
It is still not clear how this would be distributed to
depository libraries. Libraries might dial up to GPO to search,
libraries might receive the SGML tagged data so they could put it
up on their local systems, or libraries might get a monthly
cumulative CD-ROM. It is assumed that one year of the
Congressional Record would take 2 disks. It might also be possible
to produce a cumulative index of the bi-weekly indexes on a CD-ROM.
Ms. Russell said that for awhile there will probably be multiple
formats, until they find what is best and most cost-effective. The
RFP for the software is being worked on right now; so it is not
certain the selection of software will be finalized.
Joan Lippincott, Coalition for Networked Information (CNI),
spoke about CNI's Access to Public Information Program (APIP) which
has the overall purpose of improving public access to networked
government information via the Internet. The primary objectives of
this program are to push things a little more quickly than they
might happen in the formal bureaucratic environment of the
institutions that exist and to launch some experimental products
and disseminate what they learn. One of the initiatives is to
improve GPO Depository Library connectivity to and programming of
networked Federal information. Council was very much interested in
this particular initiative since it has just been talking about
electronic libraries. This may be a way to test out what the
issues are in terms of providing service to networked information,
how to receive it, how to archive it, how the receiving library can
get information out to others, both on Internet and those not on
Internet, etc. No libraries have been chosen yet for this project.
It was suggested that Carol Gordon and Jack Sulzer work with CNI in
whatever way possible and communicate back to both GPO and Council
with their findings or plan.
Carol Watts, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration,
spoke about the work being done at NOAA to collect and disseminate
data on the global change activities of the federal government.
There is a Library Information Subgroup of the Interagency Working
Group on Data Management for Global Change. In addition to saving
researchers' time and assisting those who need to obtain global
change information, this subgroup will coordinate library
collections, work with others on bibliographic problems, identify
and develop library products, work with libraries and information
producers, and address preservation issues.
Steve Hayes outlined the activities of the Dupont Circle
Group, an independent group of practicing documents librarians who
put together a discussion document on restructuring of the
Depository Library Program. All depositories should have received
copies by now.
Mike DiMario, Acting Public Printer, briefly touched on a
number of topics. (The full text of his remarks appear in
Administrative Notes, vol. 14, no. 11, May 31, 1993, pp. 1-2.)
While it is true that he is in an acting capacity, GPO is not in a
holding pattern. Some changes he proposed are linking the Council
meeting with the annual Federal Depository Conference, moving the
annual meeting and the Spring Council meeting around the country,
that new appointments to Council will come from the ranks of
working depository librarians, and changing the plan for the
distribution of the Serial Set.
In regards to the Serial Set, Mr. DiMario said that he had
received a letter from Senator Ford asking him to reconsider his
predecessor's decision about its distribution. Since Congress was
willing to move money from Congressional Printing and Binding for
the distribution of the Serial Set, Mr. DiMario sees this as the
direction Congress intended GPO to take. He also feels that the
whole issue of the Serial Set has put the Public Printer and the
Superintendent of Documents in an outrageous position of making
political decisions. That is not the function of either job.
Their jobs are largely ministerial in nature - to carry out the
mandates of the policy that have been established by the Congress
and the President. But he also acknowledged that there is only so
much funding. One method of dealing with the limited funding is
that when you run out of money, you go and advise the Congress of
that situation. The amount of money given to this program to
"inform the nation" is minute.
There was concern by Council members about Mr. DiMario's
suggestion that being a working depository librarian might be a
prerequisite to being a member of Council. Mr. DiMario stated that
it was his sense that other interested parties should be made ex-
officio members of Council. They would still participate fully in
the deliberations, but not vote. Members of Council felt that a
balance needed to be stuck in the membership of Council.
DISCUSSION OF COUNCIL DOCUMENT
Bob Oakley served as the facilitator for the discussion of the
Council draft document. The draft report does not come to any
conclusions or recommendations and it was thought that this might
result from this discussion.
The first question addressed was "why are we talking about
restructuring anyhow?" Council suggested five possible reasons for
restructuring the program. The changing nature of information
dissemination, moving from print to electronic is one reason. The
second reason is a response to the economic crisis surrounding the
program. A third reason is addressing the fact that there is a
better way, a better vision for disseminating government
information. A paradigm shift to a user driven system is the
fourth reason. Lastly, with all the electronic initiatives taking
place right now, restructuring may be needed to redefine the
depository library's role in the new information environment.
While it might be true that changing formats and a better
vision may be upper most in many people's minds, the economic
crisis is still a large factor that can't be dismissed. Observers
pointed out that it might be a political crisis or an economic
reality as opposed to a economic crisis.
The second question Council addressed was "what are the
values/goals of the DLP?" Seven such values/goals were identified
and Council felt that it was possible to define a role for
depository libraries in each of them.
Values/Goals
1. Informed electorate - government accountability.
2 Economic benefits - building better economic potential or
opportunities.
3. Education
4. Intermediaries - librarians know what information is out there
and how to find it. Libraries serve as information utilities.
5. Neutral sites - libraries serve as the boy/girl scouts of the
information arena. Libraries don't have an ax to grind, there
is no spin put on the information. As Senator Kerrey said,
"People trust libraries."
6. Libraries are the heart or focal points of communities and
therefore the obvious link to get government information to
citizens.
7. Libraries serve as a way of sharing information - between
federal government, state governments, and citizens.
It was mentioned a number of times that the $30 million dollar
program to "inform the nation" is such a small amount when you are
talking about a trillion dollar government budget. While $30
million sounds like it is not easy to cut, it is easy to cut. One
observer pointed out that the current federal budget proposal
includes $261 billion in incentive programs. Is the DLP part of
the group that should be involved in an incentive program to have
an informed nation or is it part of the group that needs to be
sliced out of the budget so that you have the money for the
incentive program? There is a need to illustrate to Congress the
value of the DLP. In some respects, the DLP is a victim of its own
efficiency. The program has made do with the funding it has
received. But we have reached the limit of what else can be done
with limited funding.
Assumptions
Next, the report itself was discussed. It was decided to
change assumption nine to read:
9. New laws, regulations and information systems, and related
changes in how government information is collected,
maintained, and disseminated will have a major impact on the
depository library program.
Assumption one, which reads, "The Depository Library Program
is and will continue to be a vital link between the citizens and
the agencies of American government needing to distribute
information" also generated discussion. It was questioned whether
we should say depository libraries or just libraries. Is this
assumption too limiting for how we envision the future? Libraries
will serve a vital link in the transition, but depository libraries
may be A link, not THE link. It was also pointed out that the
Dupont Circle Group did not make the assumption that the DLP will
exist as we now know it. Does Council really mean GPO's DLP or
rather a system of active government distribution in a systematic
way of its information resources through libraries? Additionally,
it was argued that the DLP will continue to be a vital link because
not everything is going to be electronic and the archival function
of libraries is essential. If Council can agree with the DLP
benefits statements (both to the public and to federal agencies) of
the Dupont Circle Group, then assumption one is true. It may not
be the DLP as we now know it, but there will be some designated
group of libraries to act as intermediaries between the source of
government information and the end users. The consensus of Council
was that assumption one should be changed to:
1. A depository library program should and will continue to
be a vital link between the citizens and the agencies of
American government needing to distribute information.
Alternative Scenarios
The alternative scenarios that appear in the report are the
result of brainstorming. The plan was to get a number of scenarios
out onto the table so that they could be discussed. The tougher
job is to see which ones Council likes or dislikes, and possibly
make some recommendations for the future direction of the DLP.
The scenarios can be grouped into three clusters -
economically oriented, access to electronic, and relationships
between different kinds of depositories.
Economically Oriented
Downsizing was the first economically oriented scenario that
Council addressed. Downsizing means two different things -
reducing the number of libraries in the system and also reducing
the number of items selected by libraries.
There was a general feeling among some Council members that
many smaller libraries feel that the administrative overhead is
killing them and they might be forced to drop out of the Program.
Picking up on the Basic Service Centers outlined in the Dupont
Circle Report, maybe some libraries would be willing to receive a
predetermined core set of items in exchange for different overhead
responsibilities (ie. no inspections, no disposition lists, etc.)
The question was raised as to why libraries don't just select less?
Besides the fact that this proposal would reduce the overhead
burden, there are mixed signals coming from GPO in terms of how
much libraries are suppose to select. The inspectors are telling
libraries that they have to select a certain percentage, and others
within GPO are telling libraries they need to select less.
Another option mentioned was to allow libraries to select a
core collection, with reduced overhead responsibilities, and then
shift some of the money saved to purchase equipment needed for
accessing electronic information. (Similar to what the Patent and
Trademark Office does with it Patent Depository Libraries.)
Another aspect of downsizing is requiring libraries to meet
some sort of minimum requirements or standards to be a depository
library. But what exactly is meant when we say minimum
requirements or standards? Are we talking about overhead
responsibilities, computer workstations, shelving, staffing, or
service? And are we trying to increase or decrease the standards?
In some instances we may be trying to decrease the overhead burden
so the quality of service can be increased. Equipment requirements
might be used to convince a director of the need for such equipment
in order to stay in the Program. But lowering the overhead burdens
may result in the Program not do what it was intended to do by
Congress.
Reducing the number of libraries in the system raises a whole
host of other questions/concerns. The Council report states that
one of the strengths of the Program is that depository libraries
are in every Congressional district - can we turn around and start
pulling libraries out? How do you handle redistricting and
grandfathering in which produces more than two libraries per
Congressional district? The law currently doesn't allow for
undesignating a depository library. That is why there is a strict
inspection program to meet certain standards.
It was suggested that maybe reducing the number of libraries
couldn't exist on its own - maybe it needs to be done in
conjunction with another scenario. While it is true that reducing
the number of libraries in the Program would address the economic
concerns, it may not address the other reasons for restructuring.
If there are two or three depository libraries in one district, do
they all need to be of the same service level? Can you restructure
so you have different criteria for law libraries, federal
libraries, etc.? Or different criteria levels dependent on the
number of items selected? Or could you require that all the
libraries in one Congressional district can't collectively select
more than 125% of all available items (this assumes Regionals are
excluded in this formula)?
It was suggested that we might want to recommend a moratorium
on appointing new depository libraries. It was not clear whether
this was possible to do, legally. But it might work if done in
conjunction with minimum technical requirements for a library to
become a depository. It was also unclear whether Council was
trying to say there should be no more depository libraries or there
should be fewer than the current 1400. It was suggested that we
study this more and come back to it at the Fall meeting.
The other economically oriented scenario is the direct support
model. This model has as its basis the notion that customer
satisfaction or empowerment from the perspective of the consumer is
the best measure of success and the best place to control the
system. It relies on knowing how much each library costs the
system and how much money is available to support them. Each
library then gets to chose how to spend its allocation - either on
products and services from GPO or from any other provider. This
system won't get GPO any more money, but does enable libraries to
feel more ownership in the system.
There were many questions about this model. Can GPO, would
GPO give this much control to libraries? The additional
administrative aspects to implement this are astronomical. How do
you assign value to items - by publications, by item numbers, or
what? How do you determine the base budget for each library? How
do you know when a library has spent all their money? How do you
allow for new publications? What benefits does this system provide
to users? Who is going to take the less glitzy stuff and how will
librarians know who has what?
This model is mainly designed for when GPO doesn't have enough
money. If GPO is covering all the costs and everyone is getting
what they need, then this proposal isn't necessary.
TUESDAY, MAY 18, 1993
Access to Electronics
Four of the Council scenarios fit into this cluster: 1) GPO as
the primary point of access, 2) electronic depositories, 3) minimum
technical requirements, and 4) renaming the program to recognize
changes brought on by the era of electronic information.
The first question Council addressed was "what is the role of
GPO in providing access to electronic government information?" Is
it limited to tangible products and services as is suggested in one
of the Dupont Circle Group models? Should GPO concentrate on the
print products, the things they do well, and look for another
source for depository libraries to receive the electronic
information, so they don't have to split resources to get into a
whole new ballgame?
There are many who feel that the time for central coordinated
distribution has passed. Agencies have information out there on
the Internet, and WAIS servers. Should GPO's role in electronics
be having a locator or access system? Is it wrong to say that
depository libraries are going to be able to fulfill their mission
with only online sources from GPO in the future?
Or should GPO act as an intermediary to acquire electronic
services for the DLP rather than bring them up themselves, build
its own computer system or tie into a supercomputer in the sky?
Many believe that GPO should serve a procurement role on behalf of
the DLP. One way for GPO to do this is for GPO to become a GOPHER
site, gopher into other federal data sources, or if necessary,
telnet out to get into other sources.
Or instead of GPO serving as a central gateway, should you
have electronic depositories serving as nodes themselves, serving
a more distributed function?
It was unclear whether it is too late for GPO to get involved.
Things are changing daily, maybe the best thing is for GPO to stick
itself into one of the many initiatives currently available, and
get some experience. Just getting on the Internet and
experimenting with that would be a good start. Working with CNI on
their initiative could get GPO the answer to some of the questions
we have been asking in terms of electronic depositories.
Although Council never answered the question as to whether GPO
should be in the business of providing access to electronic
government information online, the answer is in the GPO Access
bill. Assuming it passes, the specific provisions as to what GPO
should be doing are outlined in the bill. If GPO doesn't do a good
job of fulfilling the requirements of the Access bill, the question
is a moot one because GPO won't be involved in it anyway.
The bill requires GPO to provide an electronic directory.
What does this mean? Will it be a locator system of everything or
a locator to agency locator systems? Is providing a locator to
locators something we want the DLP to do? At this point there are
no incentives or standards for agencies to provide their
information in formats that are usable. How will GPO address that?
What would be lost if users went directly to the agencies as
opposed to a GPO gateway? Would there still be low cost or free
access to information if the direct access method is used? Our
fundamental principles should not disappear just because the
formats have changed.
Mr. Kelley gave his view of the situation. GPO at this point
needs to have something useful, that is visible, that is focused
and succeeds in order to move into the electronic arena and become
a player. The Access bill provides a starting point with a core of
two items. If GPO starts with high demand items, in user friendly
formats, identifies depository libraries who have the resources and
interest, who are able to provide the participation and evaluation
of what worked, then GPO can take that and build on it as a
prototype of what might work system wide. Unfortunately, funding
is still an issue.
Discussion of the third cluster of scenarios, the
relationships between different types of depositories, was
incorporated into the discussion of the Dupont Circle Group
document.
DUPONT CIRCLE GROUP DOCUMENT
Jack Sulzer served as facilitator for the discussion on the
Dupont Circle Group document. The discussion moved from GPO's role
in all of this to the actual structure of the dissemination
program. It was the general consensus of Council that the status
quo was not a viable option.
The Dupont Circle Group document has as its Service Model 1 -
Federal Information Service Centers. This is based on having three
service levels - basic, intermediary, and full. Council had had
some discussion about the basic service center yesterday. It was
decided that the depository community should be surveyed to
determine if enough interest exists for GPO to pursue this as a
viable option. While it was decided that more than one core
collection would be necessary (i.e. law, sci/tech, general), the
incentives would still be reduced administrative overhead. The
core list would not be restricted by format.
The intermediate service center seems to be the model of the
average selective depository. What makes the intermediate service
centers unique? How are they different from full service centers?
It would appear that intermediates would serve as the linkage or
transition between full and basic service centers. It became clear
that intermediate service centers are very hard to describe since
they cover a number of different people and collections.
The full service center seems to get into the role of
regionals. What is the incentive for a library to be a full
service center? Should full service centers act as libraries of
last resort? It was hard to see full service centers as separate
from regionals or subject based libraries. It was suggested that
shared regionals might be the way to go - does every regional have
to get everything? Or could 2-3 libraries share that
responsibility for a given number of states?
COUNCIL OPERATIONS
Before Council wrote the following recommendations, they
addressed some operational matters. Sandy Morton-Schwalb agreed to
attend the NTIS Advisory Board meeting May 27-28, 1993 and report
back to Council.
The Communications Committee reported on their meeting during
the Federal Depository Conference April 22, 1993. The meeting
addressed four communications questions, the comments of which are
summarized in an upcoming issue of Administrative Notes. Some of
the comments have been resolved as a result of Mr. DiMario's
remarks yesterday. Although the Communications Committee didn't
have any specific recommendations, they did throw some issues back
to Council for discussion and action. Should a friends' group of
GPO be established? Should an operations committee of Council be
established to work with the GODORT Depository Operations Work
Group? It is not the intent to have operational stuff brought to
Council to deliberate. This committee would identify operational
issues that needed an administrative response, communicate directly
with GPO to resolve them, and report to Council, but that is all.
Should GPO explore the use of teleconferencing as a way of
communicating Council deliberations to those individuals who are
unable to attend the meetings? Should there be a Communications or
Council column in Administrative Notes? Is there a way to make
Administrative Notes more timely?
How can we get more agencies to participate at the Federal
Depository Conference? Federal Publishers Committee will send out
the information about the conference if they get it in time. It
was also suggested that we get some agencies that have participated
in the conference to write a one page article about the benefits to
agencies in participating in the conference.
It was the feeling of Council that under the previous Public
Printer the bylaws we had were not a reflection of what we were
doing. Therefore, Council has drafted a mission and charter that
is more flexible, allowing for both a policy role and an
operational role for Council. In terms of the make-up of Council,
it says "at least half will work in a depository library and have
documents experience." Another change from the old by-laws is that
the election of Chair is not dependent upon class. The mission and
charter will be published in Administrative Notes to get community
feedback and then be adopted at the Fall 93 Council meeting.
Once the mission and charter are adopted they will be added to
the "Handbook of the Depository Library Council" and then the
Handbook will be disseminated to the depository community. It was
suggested that this Handbook also go with the letter to various
groups requesting names for consideration as potential Council
appointees.
The next step for Council is to clean up its draft report,
make the changes that resulted from this meeting, and get it out to
the depository community as a discussion piece. It will be printed
in Administrative Notes, along with this summary of the meeting, as
well as a comment sheet, and Council members names and addresses.
Feedback on this report is needed to make it a depository community
document.
Although it is hoped that this report will end up being a
consensus document, stating what the depository libraries' view is
of the future of the DLP, it is not Council's role to get this
document into the hands of Congress and other decision makers.
But this doesn't prevent others from taking the Council report and
using it or appending it to other reports.
In the course of making recommendations, a number of things
either got referred to the Fall meeting or it was felt a
recommendation was not needed. The Council Corner in
Administrative Notes is a given, Council just needs to submit
material to the editor. The Communications Committee will continue
to exist and Beth Duston will appoint a new member and chair in the
Fall. It was suggested that the names of members of this committee
as well as a statement of purpose be published in Administrative
Notes.
It was the sense of Council that there is a problem with
either the number of depository libraries or the way they are
distributed, since there are too many in some areas. Although
Council could not come up with a recommendation to address this
problem, we encourage GPO to give this some consideration and
invite GPO to work with Council on this. If nothing changes before
the Fall, Council will deal with this then.
The question was raised that as GPO moves into electronic
access, is Council willing to tell GPO how much to spend on this
endeavor? It was suggested that the information shared with the
focus groups would be very valuable in determining this, that if
Council members could get that financial data, then Council could
address this in the Fall.
Council was not ready to make a recommendation on
restructuring of the DLP. It is expected that this will be done at
the Fall meeting once the community has had a chance to comment.
Gary Cornwell turned the gavel over to Beth Duston who is now
Council Chair. Kay Schlueter was elected Secretary. Ms. Duston
announced that Jack Sulzer will serve as her assistant until a
Chair-Elect is chosen at the Fall meeting.
Submitted by:
Susan E. Tulis
Secretary
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