Present:  Jim Scheppke and Darci Hanning from Oregon, Deborah Littrell and Tine Walcik from Texas, Sharon Morris from Colorado, Tom Peters from Illinois, and Ellen Fox from BCR

-Request for volunteer note taker:  Tom Peters agreed to take them.  There was some discussion about some gaps in the previous notes from Jim Duncan in Colorado, about who was going to investigate the creative commons work. 

-Report on latest financial statement:  Statement dated April 30th shows a balance of $66,968.54, with no activity since that date, so that is our balance as of today.  No outstanding obligations. 

-Brief reports from the states: 

Darci reported that Oregon has 26 libraries currently using Plinkit, including 4 new ones. 

Texas had training with Joel Burton, a Plone training expert, and the regional library staff members.  As a result, Joel became more interested in our Plinkit project.  Regional staff members are getting ready for new startups.  Some systems are looking to host their own Plinkit sites, and at least one library wants to host its own Plinkit site.  No other states reported libraries that want to do their own hosting.  There was discussion about the sustainability and training issues related to these go-it-alone library Plinkit sites.  Jim asked about some liabilities that the four-state collaborative may be facing if this method of deploying Plinkit becomes popular.  Sharon expressed concerns about providing documentation for all these different types of servers.  How much input should these go-it-alone libraries have into documentation, development, and support activities from the four-state collaborative?  Texas will have some sort of MOU with this go-it-alone library, if they continue moving in that direction.  Texas has 9 systems, 8 of which are participating in Plinkit.   

Tom reported that Illinois has 9 systems, 8 of which are participating.   The Year Two LSTA grant application was submitted to the Illinois State Library a little less than two weeks ago.  Liberty Hill in Texas recently launched their Plinkit website.  Colorado has a new server and a new project team.  They have been working on the workflow mechanism within the state--checklists and priorities. 

Various Plone experts in Colorado have volunteered to help with the Plinkit project.  Darci mentioned that the issue tracking module for Plone is quite flexible, where you can assign tasks for people.  POI is the Plone tracking tool. 

-Progress report from the Project Coordinators (Darci):  Joel performed a technical analysis of Plinkit software development to date…both back-end and front-end tweaks that could be made. He presented us with a to-do list. 

The Coordinators decided to ask Joel to develop a set-up tool to help bring sites up more quickly.  Joel thought he could do that for $7,000.  His quote does not include documentation or revisions to our existing documentation.  Darci thinks we could upgrade the documentation ourselves, without hiring Toni again.  Joel also will donate 8-10 hours of consulting time in late June. 

The second piece will be to develop Plinkit 2.0.  Joel thought it would cost approx. $35,000 to do this.  The SC reached consensus to move forward on the Plinkit 2.0 project.  This would include upgrading to Plone 2.5, add code to the file system rather than via our current "through-the-web" development, so that Plinkit would become a Plone product; workflow and security upgrades to make this work better for library organizations; improvements to the user interface for library staff; adding default color schemes (but not full-blown skins).  The Plinkit Set-Up Tool would be finished by the end of June. 

For Plinkit 2.0, no start date has been discussed with Joel.  Most of that work would happen after July 1st, with 5-6 weeks of full-time work time.  We might get something by the end of August.  The Plinkit 2.0 project would require major and widespread changes to our Plinkit documentation.  Both manuals would probably need to be updated. 

-Discussion: Objectives for the Collaborative in FY 2007-08:  Calendar of recurring events would cost approx. $7,000  Skins was a low priority.  We could spend as much or as little as we want on skins.  Perhaps $10,000 for skins.  Also a more automated way of performing site upgrades.  Joel suggested that we may want to hire cheap Plone student labor to perform some of these upgrades.  The Plinkit Set-Up Tool should be finished by the end of this fiscal year.  Plinkit 2.0 project should cost approx. $35,000, plus $15,000 for the documentation of both manuals, adding lots of screen shots.  Automated upgrades project is difficult to cost out now, but would be approx. $7,000.  We need to examine the best public library sites in the country to see if there are features we should be adding.  Out-of-state travel to the LITA National Forum would cost approx. $4,000.  Maybe we should set aside some contract money for a high-level Plone consulting as a retainer.  That consult would just bill us for his/her hours at an agreed-upon rate.  Perhaps $5,000 for that.  $103,000 total for next year.  

• First priority:  Plinkit 2.0. 
  
• Documentation would be 2nd priority. 
  
• Automated updates 3rd,
  
• consulting 4th,
  
• recurring events 5th. 
  

We decided not to finalize the priorities for next year today, but ask the statewide project coordinators to seek input from their teams. 

Do we need to formally establish a user's group to get a channel for feature and upgrade requests.  Maybe we should add $20,000 in the budget to address enhancement requests from the users group. 

-Decision: How Much to Assess the Member States in FY 2007-08:   It was $25,000 per state for this year.  During the discussion, most states reported that they could do either $20,000 or $25,000.  Consensus decision:  keep the assessment at $25,000 per state for FY 08.  Jim will rewrite Addendum A to the MOA and submit it via email to the members of the Steering Committee.  People will comment and approve the revisions to Addendum A via email.  It includes both the fee and the list of expected uses. 

-Decision: Selection of Steering Committee Chair for FY 2007-08:  Jim has enjoyed being our chair.  Responsibilities include proposing an agenda, arrange for a conf call, lead the meetings, track the financial transactions, and to approve expenditures.  Jim Duncan is the official steering committee member from CO, but he was not present at this meeting.  Deborah Littrell was nominated to serve as the next Chair.  Deborah preferred to defer to Jim Duncan.  The group agreed to defer this decision until the next meeting.  

-Other:  Investigate a Creative Commons license.  Should we copyright our manuals?  Tom will investigate the process and option and report back to the group. 

Next meeting:  Friday, August 17 beginning at 9:00 a.m. PDT, 10:00 MDT, and 11:00 CDT. 

Anyone from the Collaborative partners is welcome to participate in the
meeting.