Meeting, Budget, Budget

Meeting at UCLA
On Wednesday Gary attended the Resource Library Directors meeting at UCLA. Once a year the Regional Medical Library (RML) brings together the directors of 12 academic libraries in the California, Arizona, Nevada, Hawaii and Pacific Islands region to discuss issues of importance, to share information and the learn about programs at the RML. Although negotiations are still ongoing between the RML and the National Library of Medicine, we hope to soon have a subcontract with the RML to support some of our outreach activities. This will be a real help to our budget next year.

Library budget needs
Last week Gary delivered a report to the Vice President for Health Affairs, Dr. Crist, describing budget projections for the next nine years. This brief report also laid out several plans for supplementing the library’s state budget. Later today or early on Monday, Dr. Crist will receive a report from Jeanette and Gary proposing budgetary support from the UA Health Network (UMC, UPH and Kino). Many other libraries receive support from their clinical partners and we feel that this is a good time for the UA Health Network to step up to the plate.

Other budget news
President Shelton is scheduled to announce the UA budget for the coming year later today. We have heard that there may be a 10% cut but don’t know if that would be applied equally to all departments, etc.