Government Documents Roundtable

of the Iowa Library Association

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DOCUMENTS ROUNDTABLE NEWS
Number 71, September 2005

Contents

Annual Summer Workshop Wrap-Up

Eleven library employees attended the GODORT annual summer workshop at the University of Northern Iowa on July 15. The participants learned about new developments in the Iowa and federal documents programs and attended an informational session on the services available through UNI’s Center for Immigrant Leadership and Integration. The workshop concluded with a session about UNI’s repository of Senator Charles Grassley’s papers and other holdings in the UNI archives.

GODORT at the Fall ILA Conference

Don’t forget to attend the GODORT sponsored session “Moving Forward with Data-Driven Decisions from the Census” at the Fall ILA Conference. The session is scheduled for Friday, October 21 from 11:20-12:10 and will feature Beth Henning, the coordinator of the State Library's State Data Center program. Ms. Henning will show participants how to use a variety of information products from the census, including the American Community Survey, to describe local communities and their needs. The American Community Survey is a new nationwide survey designed by the Census Bureau to provide communities with more timely information about how their demographic composition is changing. This survey will be replacing the long form questionnaire in the 2010 decennial census.

GODORT Elections and Business Meeting Agenda

We will elect next year’s officers at our annual breakfast/business meeting during the ILA Fall Conference on Friday, October 21st from 7:30-8:25 a.m. The duties of each officer, as described in our roundtable bylaws, is included below for your review. Being an officer is a great way to network and learn more about our roundtable. Please consider running for office and contact Brett Cloyd, the Nominations Committee chair at brett-cloyd@uiowa.edu, to express your interest. If you have an item you would like to place on the business meeting agenda, please contact Becky Lutkenhaus at becky.lutkenhaus@uni.edu.

Chair

  1. Presides at all meetings of the Roundtable.
  2. Prepares agendas for meetings.
  3. Calls meetings.
  4. Executes the wishes of the membership as expressed in the motions and resolutions at the last Annual Business Meeting.
  5. Liaison for the Roundtable with the ILA Executive Board.
  6. Coordinates work of officers.
  7. Appoints and directs the work of committees, as recommended by the membership.
  8. Acts, in consultation with the Executive Committee, upon all issues requiring action between scheduled business meetings of the Roundtable.
  9. Makes triennial report to the Executive Board, including a current statement of purpose and triennial projection of goals and objectives (by Dec. 31).
  10. Approves expense vouchers.
  11. Serves on Nominating Committee.

Vice Chair

  1. Presides at meetings in the absence of the Chair.
  2. Plans programs at the Annual ILA Conference and other meetings.
  3. Attends all Roundtable and Executive Committee meetings.
  4. Serves as Nominating Committee chair.
  5. Prepares annual budget in consultation with Secretary/Treasurer.
  6. Assumes the office of Chair at the conclusion of a term as Vice Chair, or whenever that office becomes vacant.
  7. Acts as Parliamentarian.
  8. Performs related duties as requested by the Chair.

Secretary/Treasurer

  1. Attends all Roundtable and Executive Board meetings, and keeps minutes.
  2. Serves as liaison to ALA GODORT, ensuring continual affiliation with GODORT, and forwarding of minutes and reports.
  3. Handles correspondence where possible, and maintains Roundtable archives.
  4. Prepares the annual budget in consultation with Vice Chair.
  5. Keeps track of the financial status of the Roundtable.
  6. Edits newsletter.
  7. Performs related duties as required by the Chair.

International Documents Information

I am a member of the ALA GODORT’s International Documents Task Force (IDTF). The group meets twice a year to talk about government information issues facing libraries and library users. One of the most interesting parts of this group’s work is the Agency Liaison Reports (see the IDTF Business page, under “Agency Liaison Program”: http://www.library.uiuc.edu/doc/idtf/business.htm).

Members of IDTF connect with a representative from a vendor or government organization to write a report about current titles or issues of interest to the documents community. The reports can provide a good source of timely information for those who work in libraries. International organizations such as the International Labour Office, International Monetary Fund, and the United Nations, and topics such as Human Rights are represented in the semi-annual reports.

UN

Among the more active organizations when it comes to digitizing information has been the United Nations. Their new weblog, UN Pulse, (http://unhq-appspub-01.un.org/lib/dhlrefweblog.nsf) provides up-to-date news briefs on important UN events and recently released documents.  Entries are sorted by date and topic and include a searchable archive.

Somewhat more complicated, the Official Documents System, or ODS, (http://documents.un.org), provides a variety of searching options to identify and view full-text versions of masthead documents and Official Records back to the early 1990s. The United Nations is busily digitizing their archives and plan to make material back to 1945 available during the next few years. ODS is also the platform used by other UN agencies who will be linking to these official documents from their web sites.

Recent updates to the UI Libraries United Nations Research Guide include these information sources.

If you have questions about UN or other International governmental information sources, please feel free to drop me a line.

Brett Cloyd
brett-cloyd@uiowa.edu
University of Iowa Libraries

Calendar of Events

Fall Depository Library Council Meeting
http://www.access.gpo.gov/su_docs/fdlp/events/fall_conference.html
October 16-19, 2005
Washington, DC

Iowa Library Association Conference
October 19-21, 2005
Grand River Center
Dubuque, IA

ILA Planning Retreat
November 11, 2005
Location TBA

2005 GODORT Officers

Becky Lutkenhaus, Chair
University of Northern Iowa
becky.lutkenhaus@uni.edu

Brett Cloyd, Vice-chair/Chair-elect
University of Iowa
brett-cloyd@uiowa.edu

Cory Quist, Secretary/Treasurer
State Law Library
cory.quist@lib.state.ia.us

 

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