Public Relations Campaign: A half million hand cards, featuring the theme "Your Local Library Has Something for Everyone," are currently being designed and printed for distribution throughout the state. Highlighting the numbers of individuals who use libraries and the many resources offered, it is hoped that these cards will help to reinforce the value of public libraries and the message that state and federal money through the Massachusetts Board of Library Commissioners helps to provide these resources across the Commonwealth. It is anticipated that the cards will first be used at the Massachusetts Municipal Association Conference in Boston in January, followed by their use at the Legislative Breakfasts in February and March, and to library patrons in every public library in Massachusetts around the time of National Library Week in April.

Regional Regulations: At its meeting of January 9 the Board acted on proposed regulations for the regional library systems that deal with regional reference services, eligibility for regional membership, and designation of a Statewide Advisory Council on Cooperative Library Programs. This formal regulatory process began in November and closed on December 13. During the comment period, the Board conducted 5 hearings that drew 82 attendees with 31 individuals addressing the Board. A total of 79 written comments were received. On the school library eligibility issue there were 2 in favor of the proposed regulation and 56 opposed. On the proposed regulation regarding the number of centers required there were 3 in favor and 8 opposed. On the proposed per capita threshold for funding there were 8 in favor and 11 opposed. There were no comments on the Statewide Advisory Council designation. The Board passed proposed regulations with suggested modifications that resulted from the hearings. Criteria for school librarians were not changed due to the outpouring of objections by school librarians.

Virtual Reference is going statewide as the regional reference centers under BPL's stewardship complete their training to go live with 24/7 reference on January 21, 2003. BPL was awarded an LSTA grant by the MBLC to implement a statewide real-time chat reference service over the Internet using the Metropolitan Cooperative Library System's (MCLS) 24/7 software and staff. 24/7 reference, developed by MCLS with an LSTA grant by libraries in Los Angeles, CA, enables libraries to purchase "seats" on their system. Purchasing of a seat means that the library is assigned a time slot to monitor the system for questions 2 hours a day. 24/7 reference librarians fill in hours not accounted for by participating libraries, enabling patrons to make queries 24 hours a day. BPL has dubbed the project, "MassAnswers," and is designing a logo that will be used as a hyperlink to the 24/7 reference system on the regional reference center libraries' home pages.

Construction Awards Database on MLIN: The Public Library Construction Awards lists have been cleaned up and moved into a database on MLIN at: http://www.mlin.lib.ma.us/cgi-bin/construction.pl. The database covers 1990 to present, including both actual construction and planning & design awards grants. Libraries on the waiting list that have not yet received awards, are not included. The database can be searched by type of project, region, library name, municipality, population (projected 20 year pop) and architect. Some pictures are available.

LSTA Grant Round Update: The Agency received 246 Letters of Intent by the December 12 deadline. This is by far the largest number of intents received in any annual grant round (206 were received last year), indicating that this year's round will be competitive. Applications from school and academic libraries continue to increase. Agency staff will conduct proposal-writing workshops in late January and early February to assist libraries with their applications, which are due on March 20.

Surveys and Reports: Four reports in the 2002 Public Library Data Series are currently being distributed. They contain data on Circulation, Education and Staffing, Salaries, and Services.

The 2002 School Library Media Center Survey is currently being conducted. Surveys were sent to over 1000 School Library Media Centers that are members of the Regional Library Systems. A report of the data will be issued in April.