From Our Corner

May 21st Update on State Stabilization Funding and Broadband Stimulus Funding

The latest news compiled from the ALA conference calls from May 20th and May 21st. If you participated in one of the calls this week, please feel free to post your own comments about what was said and what is important to take away. From the COSLA/ALA call (May 20, 2009) The call was facilitated by Melanie Anderson (Associate Director, Office of Government Relations) and Alan Inouye (Director, Office for Information Technology Policy), both with the ALA Washington Office. State… Read more

WSL Updates, May 21, 2009

Volume 5: May 21, 2009 for the WSL Updates mailing list Topics include: 1) QUESTION AND ANSWER SESSION ON THE NEW HARD TIMES GRANT CYCLE 2) LETTERS ABOUT LITERATURE AWARD CEREMONY 3) CONSUMER REPORTS GROUP PURCHASE UPDATE 4) STATEWIDE DATABASE TRIALS FOCUS ON “HARD TIMES” DURING MAY-JUNE 5) FIRST TUESDAYS PROGRAM FOCUSES ON BULLYING IN THE WORKPLACE 6) ADDITIONAL FREE ONLINE REFERENCE CLASSES TO BE OFFERED IN JULY 7) TECH SOUP WEBINARS AND EVENTS… Read more

Just sayin' ...

As many of us prepare to hit the road for the Memorial Day weekend outings, Governor Gregoire has proclaimed Thursday "Drive Nice… Read more

Newest Library on the Block

[caption id="attachment_628" align="alignleft" width="260" caption="Coyote Ridge Library"] Image [/caption] Since I was traveling all over the state and was going to be within 1 hour of Coyote Ridge Corrections Center (CRCC) I decided to stop in and get a look at the biggest and newest library branch of the Washington State Library. CRCC also has the pleasure of having two staff members and soon there will be three, but truthfully they need it.… Read more

Clippings, May 20, 2009

Clippings, May 20, 2009 Buildings: Construction plans for a new Kenmore Library (King County Library System) are still on hold, stuck in neutral until the local branch of the U.S. Post Office vacates the building library leaders want to demolish to make way for a new facility. (Bothell Reporter, Kenmore Reporter [Kent], 4.22.09) http://www.pnwlocalnews.com/north_king/bkn/news/43351512.html Letters & Editorials… Read more

Free Online Trainings for Hard Times

Need help during these hard times? Washington State Library is offering free classes to library staff to help you keep up with the increased demand. Here are some upcoming online Amigos trainings offered to the Washington library community free from the Washington State Library: Core Reference Skills Information seekers interact daily with library staff to meet their information needs. Do you have what it takes to be an effective reference provider? This course helps reference staff identify… Read more

Library of Congress American Memory

You will get lost in this site. It has everything from the History of Advertising to Women's History. It is put on by the mothership. http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/index.html

5 Questions with the Charities Manager

Rebecca Sherrell, Charities Manager for the agency’s Charities Program, explains a recent nationwide sweep against fraudulent fundraisers and gives you tips on how to protect your pocketbook. Image Q). This week, the Secretary of State is joining other states in a nationwide crackdown against fraudulent charitable solicitors who claim to help police, firefighters and veteran. So does this mean I shouldn’t donate to badge fundraisers? A). No, that is… Read more

From Your Corner of Washington

Image

-Redmond

Submit us your photo from your corner of Washington, and add our Facebook application.

Capitol Kibbles

Stuff you should know: Image

• It was almost anticlimatic, after all the hubub all winter long, but Governor Gregoire has signed a $31.4 billion two-year state budget for Washington. Laboring under a recession-driven $9 billion budget gap, lawmakers… Read more

Confused about referendum choice?

… Read more

From Your Corner of Washington

Image

-Richland at sunset

Submit us your photo from your corner of Washington, and add our Facebook application.

Remembering Mrs. Roberts

It was the summer of 1973 when I was hired among a pool of teenagers to work in the Patients Library in the original Madigan Army Hospital near Fort Lewis. There were three full-time librarians that interviewed and hired me. All three made a lifelong lasting impression. But the one who wafts in and out of my memory like a sweet fragrance is Mrs. Roberts. The head librarian was Mrs. Bruns. Mrs. Bruns was the only daughter of a wealthy family. Her childhood stories were ones of exotic… Read more

UPDATE: Gregoire signs domestic partner law; challenge afoot

Image A ballot challenge is afoot to Washington's new "everything but marriage" domestic partnership expansion. Just hours after Governor Gregoire signed Senate Bill 5688 in Seattle, the Attorney General released the… Read more

Have a day at the museum...

… Read more

From Your Corner of Washington

Image

Muir Snowfield, on the south slope of Mount Rainier, high above Paradise -Photo by Dave Whitmore

Submit us your photo from your corner of Washington, and add our… Read more

Feeling hot? It's all relative ...

At the Washington Capitol, the sun is out, but folks are still pretty bundled up. Our colleague, Patrick McDonald, who's on a tour of duty in Iraq with the Army Reserves as an elections adviser, regularly sends us great slice-of-life photos and info.

Today, we got a reminder that summer and unbearable heat has arrived in Baghdad. Says Patrick, "Just in case you think it is too cold, welcome to my world. 80 more days of this!"

… Read more

Clippings, May 15, 2009

Clippings, May 15, 2009 Contract negotiations continue for Mid-Columbia Library and Othello Library. (The Outlook [Othello], 4.16.09) http://othellooutlook.com/?p=1014 Sno-Isle Libraries and the Everett Public Library host the Big Read, a community reading of the “Maltese Falcon”. For more information check www.sno-isle.org. Nate Cushman, librarian at the Snohomish Library uses geocaching during the… Read more

Countdown to end of May voting ...

Image Folks in 11 Washington counties are voting as we speak, and it's one of the final times a May election will be held. Under terms of newly approved legislation that will scale down from four to two the number of dates authorized for springtime elections, the May… Read more

It is a drive by day... a drive by work day

Friday and the Sun has returned and is burning off the fog of the morning. I ride my Trusty Triumph to work, thinking this is the perfect day to just keep on riding, don't stop, don't park, don't go to work. A perfect drive by work day. I know there are Over Dues to do, that I have a new library clerk to train, that supplies from DOC only come today, that this is the day the crew cleans the floor, that ILL requests must be typed up and recorded, and I know that two of the crew will be having… Read more