Minutes
of the August 27, 2003 Meeting
Minutes of Meeting
In Board of Trustees
Trustees’ Collections Committee Wednesday, August 27, 2003
A meeting of the
Trustees’ Collections Committee was held in the Trustees Room
of the Johnson Building at 9:00 a.m.
Present at the
meeting were: Trustees Berthé M. Gaines and William O. Taylor; Dennis
Davis, Senior Project Manager for Industrial Development, Boston
Redevelopment Authority; Dr. John McColgan, Deputy Archivist, City
of Boston Archives; Kathleen Kirleis, Chief Financial Officer; Ruth
Kowal, Director of Operations; Gunars Rutkovskis, Volunteer; Edward
Maheigan, Budget and Procurement Manager; and Jamie McGlone, Clerk
to the Trustees.
Mr. William O.
Taylor, Chairman of the Trustees’ Collections Committee, presiding.
The first item
on the order of business was the approval of Minutes for the Trustees’
Collections Committee Meeting on May 7, 2003. On a motion duly made
and seconded, the Minutes for the Trustees’ Collections Committee
Meeting on May 7, 2003 were approved.
The Chairman reviewed
the principal purposes of the meeting which were to hear updates
on the progress being made toward the selection and acquisition
of property, the continuing relocation of collections and holdings
from the Charlestown Service building, and the ongoing planning
efforts for increasing the storage capacity of the Library’s
remote storage facility in Norwood, MA for the purpose of building
a new state-of-the-art consolidated storage facility, herein referred
to as the Boston Heritage Center.
Mr. Dennis Davis
provided an update on the ongoing efforts being made toward the
potential site selection and acquisition of property for the development
of the Boston Heritage Center. Construction of the storage facility
would provide for the appropriate storage conditions for the Boston
Public Library and City Archives archival and retrospective collections
as well as providing convenient public access within the City to
these vast collections. Once a property has been acquired, the Boston
Redevelopment Authority would undertake a space planning use study
for the site for developing the Boston Heritage Center project.
Chairman William
O. Taylor acknowledged the enormous amount of work, coordinated
by volunteer Mr. Gunars Rutkovskis, ongoing at the Charlestown Service
Building to pare down and relocate the collections and holdings
in anticipation of the Library’s move to totally vacate the
facility.
The relocation
of the historic Jordan Collection of Children’s Literature
to the Library’s storage facility in Norwood, MA has been
completed and the remaining holdings represent vast collections
of 19th century newspapers, 5,000 boxes of non-cataloged gift books,
City Archives materials, and City directories which total 35,000
square feet of material.
The Committee also
discussed the desirability of locating storage space to temporarily
accommodate the remaining 35,000 square feet of material, which
would complete the entire relocation of all materials and holdings
from the Charlestown Service building, coupled with providing space
for the Boston Public Library’s holdings at the New England
Deposit Library.
To further those
ends, the Committee discussed exploring the feasibility of reto-fitting
the Library’s remote storage facility in Norwood, MA, which
is owned by the Library Trustees and totals 140,000 square feet
of space on 3 acres of land. On a related issue, it was noted that
William A. Berry & Sons, Inc. had conducted a study of the feasibility
of expanding the facility which included a strength test report
on the building’s concrete slab for the future expansion of
shelving units.
Following further
discussion, the Chairman requested that the William A. Berry &
Sons, Inc report on the Norwood facility be reviewed and updated
to include the present cost estimates of the feasibility of expanding
the facility to temporarily accommodate the Library’s storage
needs, including housing the collections from the Charlestown Service
building and the BPL’s holdings at the New England Deposit
Library.
Meanwhile, the
installation of the ten-foot high shelving units at the Library’s
remote storage facility in Norwood, MA has been completed. Donated
to the Boston Public Library by the Boston Athenaeum, these stacks
replace the original seven-foot high shelving units and increase
the shelving capacity by nearly thirty percent in order to accommodate
for the short-term relocation of nearly one-half of the Charlestown
Service building contents.
Dr. John McColgan
suggested two potential sites for consideration which are presently
available to temporarily accommodate the remaining holdings of the
Charlestown Service building, including one facility which is already
equipped with shelving units. At the request of the Chairman, Mr.
Dennis Davis agreed to explore these sites as viable options to
address the Library’s temporary storage needs.
Dr. McColgan also
updated the Committee on the efforts underway at the City Archives
current facility to find storage space for the approximately 11,000
linear feet of the City of Boston Tax Records, 1896-1944 which are
presently housed at the Charlestown facility.
Chairman William
O. Taylor scheduled the next Trustees’ Collections Committee
meeting for Wednesday, November 5, 2003 at 9:00 a.m.
There being no
further business, the meeting of the Trustees’ Collections
Committee adjourned at 9:35 a.m.
Respectfully submitted,
Jamie McGlone
Clerk to the Trustees
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