Annual Report
(2001)
The chapter officers for 2001 were:
Diana
Cooper, Chair
The year 2001 started with a sad note, but ended with renewed optimism.
The year began for Northwest Chapter with an earthquake strong enough to send books flying off shelves. This added to the shock of unexpectedly losing Rose Emery of the Vancouver Art Gallery Library and Peter Grewenow of the University of Washington Library.
Several members of the chapter attended the Los Angeles ARLIS conference. These members and others contributed to the gift basket for the fund-raising silent auction at the conference.
After a quiet previous year and feeling sad at losing Peter and Rose, the chapter executive decided to plan a stimulating spring meeting to share experiences from the Los Angeles ARLIS conference.
The spring meeting was held at the Vancouver Art Gallery on May 4,2001. The chapter business meeting was auspicious in the oak panelled former courtroom in the Vancouver Art Gallery. The Gallery occupies a building that was once the Law Courts of B.C. This was followed by a catered buffet lunch in the Gallery library, a presentation by the well-known disaster planning consultant, Guy Robertson, and a gallery tour of Canada's foremost 19th century painter, Cornelius Krieghoff. Attendance was good and several new members were present.
At this spring chapter meeting 2 committees were established - a by-law committee to review the chapter bylaws and the Banff Meeting Planning Committee to organise a mini--conference at the Banff Centre in May 2002.
Work on the by-laws began immediately. The committee consisted of Diana Cooper, John Cull, Cheryl Siegel, Carole Goldsmith and Ed Teague. The committee identified nine amendments. A ballot was sent out the membership in fall 2001.
Marilyn Nasserden of the University of Calgary agreed to act as chair for the Banff Meeting Planning Committee and the following members were asked to be part of the committee: James Rout of Banff Centre, John Cull of Vancouver Public Library and Carole Goldsmith of Simon Fraser University. As this is a large undertaking, other members will help out when needed. This regional mini-conference will be co-sponsored by the Northwest Chapter and the Canadian Chapter.
There were changes made to the chapter website by Hollis Near of the Cornish College of the Arts in Seattle.
Chapter recipes accompanied by coloured drawings by a chapter member and minutes and a cartoon of the spring meeting were added.
The chapter executive had a meeting at the Vancouver Art Gallery on Oct. 11,2001 to plan the chapter's annual business meeting to be held on December 1,2001 at the University of British Columbia.
It was decided to hold a roundtable at the annual meeting so members could share or demonstrate projects and achievements. Roundtables might be incorporated into more chapter meetings.
Another meeting of the executive was held at Simon Fraser University on November 2,2001. A tour and lunch followed.
There were several chapter concerns identified and discussed during the year 2001. One of these is the need to attract new members. Interest and activity in the chapter seems to change from year to year between various cities separated by considerable distance - Seattle one year, Vancouver another year, Portland the next.
Certain areas of the Northwest might need more encouragement and support during less active times.
It was felt that the website should be utilised more.
We might consider advertising more aggressively for new members. One idea is to involve library schools in some of the chapter meetings or programs.
Another difficulty is handling the chapter finances in 2 countries. To alleviate the problem, John Cull opened a second account at Vancity Credit Union in Vancouver in addition to the account in Seattle at the Bank of America.
The chapter members are looking forward to an interesting mini-conference in Banff in 2002.
Submitted by
December 2001